Your walk through Pilsen, named by Czech immigrants for a city in Bohemia, brings you to the heart of Mexican Chicago. Thalia Hall, before you, was built in 1892 by a Czech businessman who modeled it on an opera house in Prague, with shops and a grand performance hall under one roof. As the twentieth century turned, waves of new arrivals reshaped Pilsen again, and from the 1950s it became the cultural capital of the city's Mexican American community.
Their presence is painted across the walls: Pilsen holds one of the largest collections of outdoor murals in the country, vivid with Aztec imagery, civil-rights heroes, and everyday neighborhood life. The National Museum of Mexican Art stands a few blocks away. Notice the murals and painted storefronts down 18th Street; you're reading a century of immigration written directly onto the brick.