More than nine years ago, Jiyan Rios Zandi created Local Brown Baby. It began as a place to explore her identity as a Kurdish and Mexican woman through photography.
“I used my camera to express those stories little by little, and then I started posting it on the internet, and people started connecting with them,” she said. “It just sort of became this like ecosystem of ideas and of community.”
Growing up in a mixed-heritage household in San Diego led Zandi to search for stories about her cultures, which went on to shape her art and photography.
“I would dress up my friends in Kurdish clothes with Nike Cortez (shoes) and gold hoops. That's who I am. I grew up with this traditional background, but I also grew up in Southern California, and I'm also a '90s kid. There's so much.”
Although Zandi loved the space she was curating online, she wanted something more tangible.
“Just a third space where people can experience in person and discover other artists, learn different stories and just feel like they can slow down.”
She found that place on Logan Avenue in Barrio Logan, a neighborhood she said is culturally significant to her.
“The rich history of Barrio Logan is something that I respect, and I cherish very much because it's a place where people have always taken art and storytelling and turned it into activism. It's a place where people have always used that method and achieved amazing things.”
A mural of a Kurdish woman holding grape leaves faces a Mexican woman holding corn on the front of the shop. The same images appear as prints on the wall inside.
“These women face each other because they also come from cultures of resistance that fight against oppression and discrimination. They're in conversation, and they're symbolizing that transcendence of borders that our struggles are more connected than we think they are.”
Handmade goods from local artists and creators fill the center of the store, reflecting Zandi’s hope that the shop becomes a platform for the community. Cards identify each maker.
“I think that a lot of things start from our own personal experience, that own absence that we have. “I think the most beautiful thing that somebody can do is create what they wish they had because it's pretty likely that most people feel the same way.”
At the end of the day, the space is about embracing who you are.
“I think (the store) is a love letter to the little brown girl inside for a lot of people. All of the things that we felt insecure about, all of the things that we had to hide growing up. This is a love letter saying, ‘Be that. Express yourself. Be yourself 100%.”
Local Brown Baby opens Saturday at noon in Barrio Logan, at 2159 Logan Ave. The grand opening will feature books, arts and food pop-ups and drinks.
