I REALLY had no idea what to expect when I went to Barcelona in terms of streetstyle and as predicted, the trip resulted in no pictures either. But I do have a few observations and a few questions. On a rollocking Saturday night, I saw girls get on and off the Metro in huge gangs wearing LOTS of make-up, curly hair that’s gelled at the side, ‘Monroe’ piercings (a metal stud on one side of the upper lip) with outfits that consisted of tops cut-up in such a way that I never knew possible and SHORT short skirts. I’ll be honest and say, that if I met them in an alleyway in the dark, I’d be peeing my pants. These girls looked really TOUGH. Even my male friend winced and looked slightly scared.
It is no exaggeration when I illustrate the tops with the pic above – the ones I saw were skimpier!
My other friend then called this chola style. I nodded knowingly at the time but really, I was baffled. My knowledge of ‘chola girl’ style is very scant. London’s Hispanic population is not huge and they don’t really hang out in big tribes like they do in say, LA or New York. I didn’t even know the word ‘chola’ existed until I saw American magazines throwing the word about and read how ‘chola’ fashion influenced Gwen Stefani’s L.A.M.B. collection. Funnily enough, when you Google chola girl, Gwen Stefani’s name comes up a LOT. But what I saw in Barcelona was of a different vein altogether.
Urban Dictionary helped me out a little bit but also confused me as it stated that a chola girl was of Central American (Mexico, Cuba) origin, so was what I saw something derived from Central America? From the description of the heavily made up, street tough ganster-type girls, physically it sounded about right.
(Image taken from MySpace page of R.I.P. Tio David – can’t really figure out what this is either!)
Obviously this is the polar opposite of my style, but because the way they wore their clothes with such uniform regiment and the specific way they were made up, it made me think how they were so stylised, it’s somehow better than having no style at all. A bit like the chav chic trend that’s on the up in London. I don’t think these girls were wearing what they wearing for irony’s sake but it was interesting to me how they were all dressed in such a way, like there was real intention with the way they want to be seen style-wise.
So can anyone elaborate on the subject of the chola girl? Any US West Coast readers out there since most of what I googled ended up in a lot of MySpace girls from California? Was what I saw in Barcelona ACTUAL chola girl style? Or was it something else altogether? I’m not saying I’m loving it loving it loving, but I am hella intrigued. I apologise in advance if you’re reading this and thinking ‘God…this girl is a complete ignoramus!’.
chola style is mainly worn by mexican girls who like to wear black lipliner and have overly gelled hair.they wear either super short skirts or wear tight jeans that they scrunch up at the ends showing off their air force ones. its really tacky looking.
the way i know a chola girl (or troll-a girl) is as a latina gang banger or a girlfriend of gang member. they are feared and fearless. long nails, thin penciled-in arched eyebrows, crunchy hair and like camay said heavy black lip liner (yuck!). as to why BCN is adopting this style i don’t know. it’s stupid tacky. like a euro interpretation of a u.s. hip hopper: always forced, never quite right…
I live in Southern California, and the chola look seems to be most popular with small but very noticeable transvestite population. Incidently, their main drag (pun intended) is a street near the Mexican/Hispanic neighborhood.
if you watch the amazing movie Mi Vida Loca it will give you a bit of the scene.
as far as i know is it’s LAgirl gang style, with spanish, mexican, cuban inflluences. heavy makeup, mainly eyeliner and lipliner. sometimes the lipliner is black. hairgelled supertight on the sides with a high tight ponytail. sneakers. wifebeaters. sort of mixes with rockabilly style. slight pompadours. and tattoos. no one has mentioned those yet.
here is an LA tattooist who comes from that scene http://www.mistercartoon.com/home.html there is a section on girls with tattoos in there. it sort of gives an idea.
sorry if my info is a bit off, i’msure it is, i am a white girl who lives on Canada’s west coast, who used to have a lot of mexican friends, and we lived in Barcelona. maybe you met my old friend Professor Angel Dust there, he could give you the lowdown. i love the chola look.
but you really have to watch this movie
http://imdb.com/title/tt0107566/
then maybe you will love it too
if yoy want to research about the chola thing in barcelona try to google “bakala” o “makinera” (is their music, a kind of weird tecnho), they are the spanish version of english chavs
I grew up and went to school in the San Fernando Valley, a suburb in Southern California with a sizeable Hispanic population. The first two posters are right on, and the third might be as well, but I mainly noticed the chola look on girls in middle school and high school. Most girls grow up out of that phase of gelled hair and dark lip liner by the time they’re older. Latinos in the L.A. club scene tend to dress pretty standard hip-hop these days.
Some cholas were pretty gangster, with tight, cropped tank tops and super baggy jeans (not always super tight), maybe a flannel shirt. It was a popular book back in the late 90s. Gwen Stefani did rock that sort of look for a while, including the gelled-up pomp.
A scowl is pretty important, too.
I’m Mexican and I grew up in California with Cholo and Chola cousins. Back in the late 70’s when I was about 10, a few years before moving to Texas. Back then Chola’s dressed like their male counterparts – long sleeved, plaid, button up shirts with only the top button buttoned over white wifebeaters or white Hanes tshirts. Dickies baggies, it had to be Dickies, and they had to be ironed with a sharp crease. Black belts and black shoes or black “China dolls”, black cotton shoes with brown rubber soles made in China that looked like Mary Janes. They penciled in their eyebrows and wore dark red lipstick and their hair was a worn long and straight and feathered back at the top, no gel, though, at least not back then. Cholos would wear Stacy Adams shoes and God help you if you accidentaly stepped on their Stacy Adams, that was grounds to get the heck beat out of you. Back then they did’nt wear too feminine clothes because they were just as tough as their male counterparts, you did’nt want to cross these girls! Now they seem to wear more colorful clothes and different hairstyles. We were never allowed to dress this way, my father forbid it, that’s the main reason he moved us to Texas, so that we would’nt be sucked into that lifestyle. I’m forever grateful he did that!
I’m from outside of Chicago and lived in a town with a huuuuge hispanic population. My high school was full of the chola type girls with the heavily gelled hair pulled back in a severe ponytail, the black lipliner with no lipstick, the penciled eyebrows and the skimpy tops. But a lot of the girls in my high school would pair the skimpy tops with really big baggy pants and were always wearing those really chunky Sketchers sneakers. A few others wore tight black polyester pants with the huge bells and big chunky black shoes. Oh, and you can’t forget the big gold hoop earrings and lots of fake gold necklaces. But they were pretty damn tough.
watch the Gwen video “Luxurious” for an idea, it’s based on that!
Chola girl- heavily made up, tight tight clothing, shiny expensive sneakers, gelled hair. They tend to be involved with guys in gangs so they end up extremely tough or emotional wrecks.
I think it’s cute how you said “hella”! That’s such a Northen California thing, haha (where I’m from).
Wow that’s so interesting! In England you have the equivalent called Chavs (although they aren’t race particular – you get white just as much as you get Asian chavs), and in Scotland we call them Neds, and it’s similar in the sense these people, be it Chavs, Neds or Cholas, are all following a specific ‘uniform’ which identifies them as being a Ned or a Chav etc. But the funny thing is, if you were to approach an average Ned here and call them a Ned, they’d be horrified – they don’t see themselves as Neds half the time! But they’ll point out another Ned and say (in your best Scottish accent) “am no a ned, he’s a ned!” but to us they look exactly the same! LOL!!!
I live in Echo Park where Mi Vida Loca ws filmed by Allsion Anders who is a pal of mine:)
This is a fierce look that yes, Gwen copped in a way but is best on the girls in my hood.
Afshan: My geeky foray into language of the youth…. you won’t hear that too often!
Ah…it seems chola is a Californian thing that’s more hip hop inspired than slutty slutty (which is what I saw in Barcelona). Thanks for giving me a bit more insight and info. Dear god, I hope there aren’t any chola girls reading this and thinking I’m a complete fooligan…..
And I may just check out Mi Vida Loca – sounds great.
A friend forwarded me your link, as she noticed you posted a picture of my legs!! (I’m on the left of the three photos.) How’d you find me? Just curious.
well, indeed being chola or killa in spain is a little bit different. generally, cholas, have fun going to house and flamenco discos, wearing gold jewelry, are generally pretty nazis, they dont like other nationalities and are very patriotic. they shout a lot and swear much more, and usually dont have any studies. pretty vulgar and plain minded.
and just because an image is worth 1000000 words
http://www.mundokillo.com/images/album/4705cb46bbfcaf9be623000130b438dfo_O_b4k4l4_O_o.jpg
http://www.mundokillo.com/images/album/1bbc24cf3bf31dc825711ba030146364Sa_LuKeTaH.jpg
http://www.mundokillo.com/images/album/743c2cbbc15d22fe78b6b943067e5180MoReNazZa_Speed.jpg
http://www.mundokillo.com/images/album/50a006c8e029845858910d47416d97bcDj_MaRi.jpg
http://www.mundokillo.com/images/album/c18c25056b69c0bb37ff6a8ee2edf868Dj_MaRi.jpg
http://www.mundokillo.com/images/album/90ae0c0b29eb6eba665fc370c1510755Dj_MaRi.jpg
http://www.mundokillo.com/images/album/d8b10efb1e6264f81a46aef0816aed79Dj_MaRi.jpg
http://www.mundokillo.com/images/album/b91a95445c4a35b4bd78e0b10557d51dChaTuNGaS_SbD.jpg
http://www.mundokillo.com/images/album/f616bdbb6f1a40adee14a0ec5a8b5f4dBombshell.jpg
Chola: a mexican girl gangbanger,who wears dark red lipstick or black lipstick,black lipliner,crunchy over gelled hair with bangs that are 5inches high.They wear dickies with the perfect crease down the middle and long belt that go a little pass the knees.They wear baby doll shirt or sometime theywear jerseys with a number that will rep there gang like 13 for SUR They wear sneakers mostly black cortez with thick black laces.Oh and they sometime be packin a 45 under the jersey or whatever gun they want to carry.Tattoos you cant be no true chola if you dont got any tattoos.They mostly have their nickname tattooed on them just like sadgirl from “mi vida loca” or they gang their in. I should know alot about cholas cuz im one of them.I got tattoos just like them and are in a gang like most of them. If you want to talk hit me up at South_side_girl602@yahoo.com ~ALRATOZ~
ok forgive me if i sound like a COMPLETE idiot here (not to mention its a little off topic) but could someone maybe elaborate on what exactly “chav” is? Its been mentioned in a few previous posts as well as the chola one so figured i should finally ask. i’m from the states and it doesn’t sound quite like anything we have here, although the vibe i’m getting is sort of “trailer park” or maybe pseudo ghetto/gangsta is that anywhere close?
EY A CHOLA IS A GANGSTER GIRL ORALE? N ITS NOT ONLY IN “CALIFAS” THOSE R ALL SCRAP HOES…WE GOT CHOLAS HERE TOO IN WICHITA KANSAS I AM ONE WE ALL DO NOT WEAR HELLA GELLED UP HAIR U KNO THERE ARE CHOLAS WITH STYLE. WE ALL DONT WERE BLACK LIPLINER N DRAW OUR EYEBROWS THIN SO ALL YOU LITTLE WHITE SUBURB LIVIN GIRLS NEED TO QUIT STEREO TYPIN CHICANAS OR ANY OTHER HISPANICZ. N YEA WE ARE FEARED BY OTHER CHOLAS. N YEA WE ARE GIRLFRIENDS OF GANG BANGERS U LIL RICH BITCHES GOT A PROBLEM? N WE DO WEAR THE PERFECTLY CREASED DICKIES LIKE THOSE SURENOS (SKRAPS) DO IN CALI.BUT WE WERE THEM BETTER CUZ OURS R BLACK.WE WERE OUR MANS CLOTHES OR OUR BIG BROTHERS.WE WERE BEATERS N JERSEYS. N WE DO GOT TATTOOS.N OUR GOLD IS NEVER FAKE. WE DONT WEAR CHEEP SHIT OUR PARENTS RAISED US BETTER THAN THAT.N U AINT NO REAL CHOLA IF U DONT HOLD IT DOWN FOR YO SHIT-VATO LOKO BOYZ 22 SKRAP KILLA VATA LOKA GIRLZ-SO YEA I JUST GAVE U A DEFINITION OF A REAL GANGSTA BITCH
Ya” KEEP it up wit the cholita Style fuck the haters we be ridin on some real shit’pinches cocos dont know shit about the mexican hood life’Big Shout outz to my hood P.C.FUCK THE REST!
I say que Onda with the matha fucken putas talking shit we keep it firme and gangstery we still coming up on yo lil white faces
ive grown up in Boyle heights, and im mexican, the chola style has died out and has been replaced by this distorted “baller” bullshit that has nothing to do with the way that we live. the chola’s and hyenas or whatever we may call ourselves are becoming less and less as we try more and more to be white girls. But lets please not become ignorant, rep your shit but dont cram it down skinny white girls throats reading this shit in fucking ohio. they dont know what theyre talking about and they dont mean to insult anyone, theyre just curious about a world theyll never know. can u blame them? could u trade your familia your barrio for some stepmom in a gated communitie in utah?
WAS UP TO ALL U BITCHES ON HERE TALKIN SHIT IM A CHICANA CHOLA BROUGHT UP IN WEST LOS SO TO ALL U RICH ASS WHITE LIL BITCHES ON HERE SAYIN WE ALL DO THAT SHIT FUCK U! U DONT KNOW CHIT FUCKIN GRINGAS SO DEEP THRAOT LIKE U ALWAYZ DO FUCKIN HOES BEING A CHOLA JUS AINT A FUCKIN STYLE ITZ CALLED FUCKIN SURVIVAL! FUCK ALL U LEVAS! EZ UP
LA KILLER WS XV3ST TLS THE DEVILS MOHTAFUCKIN GANG!
WELL ALLS I GOTS TO SAY IS THE CHOLA STYLE IS THE RITE WAY TO GO .CUZ CRUISIN IN A LOWRIDER WITH UR PLAID SHIRT AND UR CORTEZ WITH SUM DICKIES AND A WIFE BEATER LISTENIN TO ART LABOE WITH UR MAN IS THE BEST FEELIN IN THE WORLD AND WEN U DRESS LIKE THAT U GET NOTICED AND MOST IMPORTANTLY RESPECTED.THAT STYLE IS MOSTLY SO CALI STYLE AND U CAN FIND IT IN THE HEART OF EAST LOS OR SAN DIEGO OR IE AND NOW OC IS STARTING TO GET RECOGNIZED.BUT MOSTLY U SHOULDNT DRESS LIKE THAT IF UR NOT DOWN TO HANDLE YOURS IS ALL IM SAYIN
das right yall hold it down fuh yall hood vive la cholas
—————-first of all if ur ass dont know shit about this then comment dis pendejas !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! cholas are female gangsters MOST cholas do wear there arched eyebrows and we do wear gelled hair i do crease my damn dickies NOT only cuz dey look good in mi opinion but it also represents our pride in our people bak den it was rare to see a mexican in da army so all da lil carnales (brothers sister) copied the creased dickies look to look like der family member dickies were the cheapest pants bak den ALL OF WAT WE WEAR DOES HAVE A MEANING WE ARE NOT IGNORANT -those arent true cholas those are LEVAS wanna be cholas so like i said be4 dont comment if u dont know!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! by da way any questions ask me ALRATROZ —————————
real chola style
http://i12.tinypic.com/43c3dox.jpg
http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g175/La_LiL_ShOrTy/CHOLA.jpg
http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a335/SchizophrenicFishes/chola.jpg
http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c93/DAMAS_D_ARRANQUE/Picture037.jpg
http://www.dctvny.org/productions/latin_kings/07_ig_queens.jpg
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y46/pinkink04/Virgencita2.gif
http://www.library.txstate.edu/SWWC/WG/PHOTOS/iturbide/iturbide_cholas5x7.jpg
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a4/Chulastar805/ogAbelcreation.jpg
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y46/pinkink04/cholashygirl.jpg
YOU AINT NO CHOLA IF U AINT A SUR3NA.