A sprawling new mural stretching 8 feet tall and 30 feet wide is set to cover an exterior wall of the Valley Hi-North Laguna Public Library, weaving together Hmong, Filipino and Palestinian textile traditions into a single public artwork. Titled Threads of Belonging, the installation formally unveils next Monday, August 31, at the South Sacramento branch, capping months of planning by three local artists and support from city officials.
The project began as the vision of lead artist Jamie Pesquiza Cardenas, who grew up in South Sacramento and Valley Hi, according to the Sacramento Bee. She has described the mural as the magnum opus of her life, saying she created it specifically for her hometown, and that the project is meant to start a conversation about how people belong to each other. Cardenas designed the mural's Filipino component around the Ilocano kusikus weaving pattern, a spiral motif that Luzon folklore has long held wards off malevolent spirits and conveys kapwa, or shared community connection, according to the Burke Museum.
Three Artists, Three Traditions
Cardenas collaborated with co-creators Pachia L. Vang and Ren Allathkani to design patterns symbolizing motifs from Palestinian, Filipino/Ilocano and Hmong cultures, per the Sacramento Bee's reporting. Vang, an anthropologist and founder of the Sacramento community studio Culture through Cloth, designed the Hmong section using the paj ntaub “house” motif, an appliqué pattern representing family, memory and longing for home, according to the Alliance for California Traditional Arts. Vang also hosts regular Paj Ntaub Circles at the HOPE Center in Sacramento.
Allathkani, a Palestinian American artist based in nearby Elk Grove, designed the Palestinian section using tatreez, a centuries-old cross-stitch embroidery tradition that symbolizes Palestinian heritage, land connection and cultural endurance, according to a Culture through Cloth fundraising page on Givebutter. Together, the three artists describe Threads of Belonging as embodying the idea that people are more similar than different, according to the Sacramento Bee, and the finished piece is intended to reflect the cultural traditions of Sacramento's immigrant communities.
City Support and National Funding
The mural moved forward with early backing from Sacramento's Office of Arts and Culture and from City Councilmember Mai Vang, who represents District 8, the Sacramento Bee reports. The city officially approved the piece as a temporary installation through its Art in Public Places program, with staff assisting on planning, permitting and licensing, according to the City of Sacramento. That municipal support did not come with general-fund financing for the project itself.
Beyond that local backing, the artists secured partial funding through the National Academy of Design's Edwin Austin Abbey Memorial Trust Fund for Mural Painting, with Councilmember Vang's District 8 office acting as a co-applicant on the proposal, per the same city announcement. Vang, elected in November 2020, became the first Asian American woman and first person of Hmong descent elected to the Sacramento City Council, according to her office's biography. Her involvement carries added resonance in a district where, per Data USA figures drawn from U.S. Census Bureau survey data, Hmong is spoken in more than 7,000 households across South Sacramento and North Laguna — among the highest concentrations of Hmong speakers in Northern California.
How the Money Came Together
Cardenas's own path to the project was shaped by a separate city program. The Sacramento's Office of Arts and Culture rolled out a $2.04 million Creative Growth Fellowship in September 2025 using federal American Rescue Plan Act funds, awarding $850 monthly stipends to 200 local artists; that stipend allowed Cardenas to rent studio space for her loom, according to Comstock's Magazine. To cover mounting expenses, installation hardware and free public weaving workshops, Culture through Cloth also launched a community crowdfunding campaign that raised over $8,200 toward a $10,000 goal, per the Givebutter campaign page.
The mural will hang on the exterior of the Valley Hi-North Laguna branch, a 20,300-square-foot, LEED Gold-certified facility at 7400 Imagination Parkway that opened in August 2009 next to Shasta Community Park, replacing a smaller library on Mack Road. More information about the project and the artists behind it is available through Culture through Cloth. Threads of Belonging is scheduled to be showcased on the library's exterior wall starting Monday, with the formal unveiling event set for that same day, according to the Sacramento Bee, whose arts and culture coverage first detailed the project.
