This is part of an Arts Access series called “Home is where the art is,” which gives an inside look into the art that North Texans treasure in their homes.
In the backyard of Paul Longoria’s Oak Cliff home, sparkling lowriders glide past a barber shop and taco joint before hopping along a parking lot.
There’s even a gas station, police cars and palm trees with the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge in the distance. How is this possible?
It’s a track for miniature lowriders that fits within about 220 square feet. Longoria designed the track to reflect Jefferson Boulevard, which is filled with real-life lowriders every Sunday.
“We have a big lowrider culture here. So I mean this is where the home of the lowriders is in Dallas, Oak Cliff,” said Longoria who was born and raised in the Dallas neighborhood.
Back when he was 14, Longoria built miniature lowriders and entered them into model car shows. He took a break to be a teen and explore graffiti, but returned to building miniature lowriders in 2019. These days, he sits in the backyard with his kids playing on his track for hours.
“Lowrider culture and Oak Cliff, it's a big family. We all kind of know each other. We all respect each other and it's all about keeping the culture alive, passing it on to the little ones.”
This interview has been lightly edited for clarity.
Can you describe your miniature-lowrider track?
It's made to drive your lowrider radio-controlled cars on, and it's made out of almost everything you can come up with: cardboard, wood, plastic pieces, graffiti, drawings.
It's straight street blocks, not a lot of curves and circles. So it’s just like a normal boulevard street. It's a big obstacle course. You have to make it through without hitting anything. You might want to fill up and get some gas or park your car in one of the garages.
Where did you get your miniature-lowrider track from?
I made it. You have to be dedicated and you have to either draw your storefront or come up with a lot of parts. You know, go to MJ Designs, Hobby Lobby, find their little miniature wood and windows, all that type of good stuff to do it. But you really have to be creative and into it.
Some of the buildings are cardboard, some of them are wood. You kind of like to throw decoy boxes into more realistic buildings, just to give it more of a city vibe, more of the whole shopping center.
[The lowrider miniature cars] do come built, but these are custom painted and then you add murals, a different trim, and now you can upgrade motors, add more voltage, just like the real lowrider cars. So they're getting pretty realistic.
Where is your miniature-lowrider track and why did you place it there?
It's in my backyard. This was an old basketball court that I had, but we cut the basketball goal down to make this.
I put it here because I have small children. I have a small son and this is just something so me and him can bond and we stay out here for hours playing together.
How does having your miniature-lowrider track make you feel?
It's pretty nice. It's fun. I love to see my son's eyes when he sees it all out here. He's ready to grab all his toys inside and bring them out here, and he can stay out here for hours playing.
I'm trying to make him a perfect driver right now. So he's learning how to drive and hit the switches. But once that happens, all this will be his. All these cars are his.
How does your miniature-lowrider track represent home for you?
This is Big P's world. Sometimes I sit here and I wish I can just shrink down and walk around on it.
I have a lot of friends that are involved in it. They bring buildings over. We collab. Once we all get together, it gets kind of outrageous and it’s lots of fun.
Arts Access is an arts journalism collaboration powered by The Dallas Morning News and KERA.
This community-funded journalism initiative is funded by the Better Together Fund, Carol & Don Glendenning, City of Dallas OAC, The University of Texas at Dallas, Communities Foundation of Texas, The Dallas Foundation, Eugene McDermott Foundation, James & Gayle Halperin Foundation, Jennifer & Peter Altabef and The Meadows Foundation. The News and KERA retain full editorial control of Arts Access’ journalism.
