![\"Hollywood](\"https:\/\/www.ocregister.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/LDN-L-DIADELOSMUERTOS-102-06.jpg?w=620\")
<\/p>\nA kitchen table is covered in plastic. In the middle, a small glass vase holds freshly cut flowers alongside two salt shakers, the kind you might find at a secondhand shop. A plate of Mexican sweets sits to the right, a jar of salsa to the left, surrounded by all the familiar fixings of a kitchen where loved ones gather, stories are shared and nothing feels particularly out of place.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s the kind of kitchen where pancakes are made \u2014 really good ones, according to those lucky enough to have eaten them \u2014 and where the smallest objects seem to know exactly where they belong.<\/p>\n
Except this isn\u2019t a kitchen at all.<\/p>\n
The table sits inside an 8-by-8-foot space at Hollywood Forever Cemetery. In 2021, two brothers recreated their mother Irma\u2019s East Los Angeles kitchen as an ofrenda after she died during the COVID-19 pandemic, carefully piecing together the room through the foods, flowers and familiar objects that made it hers.<\/p>\n
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Hollywood Forever will welcome back its D\u00eda de los Muertos celebration on Saturday, Oct. 24.
\n(Photo by Mauricio Hoyos\/Hollywood Forever)\n<\/p>\n
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Hollywood Forever will welcome back its D\u00eda de los Muertos celebration on Saturday, Oct. 24.
\n(Photo by Mauricio Hoyos\/Hollywood Forever)\n<\/p>\n
Expand<\/a><\/p>\n For Angie Jimenez, Hollywood Forever\u2019s<\/a> Altar Program Coordinator and Director of Altars for its annual D\u00eda de los Muertos<\/a> celebration, there was something unexpectedly familiar about it.<\/p>\n Jimenez had known Irma years earlier. She recognized her sons, but more than that, she recognized the kitchen they had rebuilt, a place where she remembered sitting and eating some of the best pancakes she\u2019d ever had. Now, years later, she was standing in a cemetery looking at pieces of that kitchen again, recreated by two sons determined to bring their mother and the home she made for them back to life for a day.<\/p>\n \u201cIt just felt like you were in Irma\u2019s little kitchen,\u201d Jimenez recalled with a laugh.<\/p>\n That feeling extended beyond Jimenez\u2019s own memories of Irma. Each year, judges walk among the community-built ofrendas before selecting those that stand out in the celebration\u2019s altar competition. In 2021, both found themselves lingering at Irma\u2019s kitchen.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen it came time for the judges to deliberate, they both had that ofrenda on their lists,\u201d Jimenez said. \u201cThey had stood in front of it for a while and were really taken aback by it. It didn\u2019t have all the elements of a traditional ofrenda, but that\u2019s exactly what it\u2019s about. They put all the things that Irma loved on that table.\u201d<\/p>\n Irma\u2019s kitchen is one of the altars that has stayed with Jimenez through nearly a decade of overseeing the program, where remembrance is built from the seemingly ordinary things that made a person\u2019s life distinctly their own.<\/p>\n On Saturday, Oct. 24, 70 ofrendas will fill the grounds of Hollywood Forever<\/a> for its 27th annual D\u00eda de los Muertos<\/a> celebration, held this year under the theme All Under One Sky, or Bajo un Mismo Cielo. Nearly 300 Aztec and folkl\u00f3rico dancers will take part in the celebration, alongside its traditional Ceremonial Procession and a day of live music led by DannyLux<\/a>, Trish Toledo, Tropa M\u00e1gica and Los Shadows, with DJs Que Madre, JOAQU.N and Dro Barlo.<\/p>\n But for Jimenez, the ofrendas remain the \u201cheart and soul\u201d of it all.<\/p>\n At its core, she said, creating one is an act of welcome. Families gather photographs, prepare favorite foods and drinks and place belongings that carry the imprint of the person they are honoring. Marigolds, or cempas\u00fachil, are traditionally used to help guide spirits back with their distinct aroma. Water is offered after the journey, while photographs invite the person being remembered back into the space.<\/p>\n \u201cThink about it as if you\u2019re throwing a party,\u201d Jimenez said. \u201cYou\u2019re going to lay out your loved one\u2019s favorite food, their special drink, their favorite things. The idea is that, just for a day or two, they come and visit us. We\u2019re the ones who are still here, breathing and living. It\u2019s a symbol of the circle and cycle of life.\u201d<\/p>\n For some families, Jimenez has watched the act of creating that space become part of grieving itself, a chance not to leave sadness behind, but to let love, joy and memory exist beside it.<\/p>\n \u201cIt can be very comforting and healing for families who have never experienced this,\u201d Jimenez said. \u201cIt shows them that grieving doesn\u2019t always have to happen through tears or pain. You can also grieve by celebrating someone, honoring their memory and creating a space that feels like you\u2019re welcoming them back.\u201d<\/p>\n Jimenez knows that feeling intimately.<\/p>\n Born in the United States and raised in Guadalajara, Mexico, Jimenez grew up with D\u00eda de los Muertos as part of her family\u2019s traditions. She\u2019s worked with Hollywood Forever for more than 13 years, but over time, the cemetery and the celebration she helped steward became intertwined with her own experiences of love and loss.<\/p>\n