Mayor Zohran Mamdani presented Bronx designer Edwin Reyes’s framed artwork “Bandera Viva” to María Antonia “Toñita” Cay at Toñita Fest on June 28, an annual street festival in Williamsburg that draws thousands to celebrate Cay and the Caribbean Social Club she has run for 52 years, according to Noticia NY.
The festival filled Grand Street between Driggs Ave. and Roebling St. with live music, dance performances, a Latin DJ, street soccer, merchandise, and cheap beers. Some attendees came carrying oversized cutouts of Toñita’s face.
Mamdani took the main stage and opened with “Yo soy Boricua” to crowd cheers. He called Cay “an icon of this city” and said she has every day helped build a sense of community and recognition for Nuyoricans across the five boroughs. He relayed Cay’s own words, saying she stays for her people as long as she can, not to make money or a fortune, but to keep a space where everyone can be together. He mentioned Puerto Rico’s ongoing water and energy crises and the recent earthquake in Venezuela that killed more than 1,450 people. He closed his remarks by leading chants of “¡Toñita! ¡Toñita! ¡Toñita!” and “Go New York, go New York, go!”
Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso also appeared, presenting Cay with a key to Brooklyn and calling the club and its founder “cultural icons.” Reynoso said it is an honor that her home is here in Brooklyn.
Cay has run the Caribbean Social Club on Grand Street for more than five decades as a gathering space for Puerto Ricans and the broader Latino community. She has turned down offers of millions of dollars to sell the building, per Noticia NY, while the surrounding neighborhood has gentrified. The club has kept drawing regulars for dominoes, billiards, dancing, and low-cost beers. Bushwick Daily covered the club last month when Knicks guard Jose Alvarado, a Los Sures native, brought the NBA championship trophy to Toñita’s after New York ended a 53-year title drought.
The artwork Mamdani presented, “Bandera Viva,” is based on one of Reyes’s most recognized designs: a handmade Puerto Rican flag that singer Lorén Aldarondo Torres of the group Chuwi wore onstage during Bad Bunny’s acclaimed residency tour. For the version made for Cay, Reyes used red, white, and light blue, the colors associated with Puerto Rican independence, rather than the darker blue that more closely resembles the American flag.
Mamdani’s office first contacted Reyes via Instagram DM the Friday before the festival, after seeing prior coverage of his work, asking him to create a piece of his choosing to present to Cay, Reyes told Bronx Times, as reported by Noticia NY. With just one day to complete the piece, Reyes had to source materials and a frame quickly. His friend Joselyn Rodríguez, a Bronx-based creator and Etsy shop owner, made a metal plaque commemorating the artwork’s name and the occasion.
Reyes told Bronx Times the whole sequence felt surreal. “I felt really seen as a designer and creative,” he said. “That they trusted me to do what I wanted was very exciting.” He described himself as a homebody but said the festival’s energy won him over. He described it as hot and sometimes claustrophobic but said he loved it. He added that he was already thinking about creating a smaller version of “Bandera Viva” for display, and said he is “excited to see what comes from this.”
