commercial districts

Often cities have various commercial districts that focus on certain wares. For instance, in New York I know of a kitchen supply district and a carpet district. BA has those too. I live in the commercial textile district, where shops sell cloth to designers and manufacturers. A friend lives in a sort of hardware/machine district in which every other shop is dedicated to lawn mowers (which is strange because there isn´t a lot of private grass here in the city).

Yesterday during one of my epic ambulatory journeys throughout the city, I stumbled on two very strange districts. First was the ´Cotillion´ district which consisted entirely of costume shops and party stores. So if you want balloons, you have to travel to this completely out-of-the-way place (in barrio Once on calle Lavalle). Second, further down Lavalle was the entirely creepy ´Mannequin´ district in which all the store windows of a two block area were filled with nude androgenous look-alikes. I´ve never actually thought about where mannequins come from, but I guess they have to come from somewhere...