Story photos by Oona Robertson, except where noted.

In a quiet backyard on the east side of Las Vegas, Nevada, Luis Avila Chavez lays out the frame of a security door with steel tubing. After squaring the corners and MIG welding them into place, he adds a steel box that will hold the door handle, and uses calipers to measure out vertical bars with spacing he describes as “smaller than the head of a baby.”

His shop occupies a corner of the yard, its roof built around the trunk of a palm tree. As he works, a chicken pecks at the ground, the smell of caramelizing onions drifts through, and his shop dog jumps about, expertly avoiding anything sharp.

A third-generation metalworker, Chavez learned the trade from his father, who in turn was taught by his great-uncle. The family business has traditionally focused on building steel fences, gates, and doors, and Chavez carries those skills and techniques forward with pride. But he’s also drawn to more creative work. “I’ve always had a passion for art,” he says.

Inspired by the metal that surrounds him every day, Chavez, who is 27, says he’s “trying to break out of strictly residential work, trying to get more creative.” The door he’s making now, for example, which is designed to look like the entrance to a liquor store, is for a local art exhibition called “Hair of the Dog.”

“The cure for a hangover is to have another beer, so it’s a cycle that keeps going,” says Chavez. “[The exhibition is] just kinda talking about addiction here in Vegas… [where] everybody has a vice.”

Home to 3 million people, Las Vegas is a widespread valley of suburbs that radiate from its economic heart, aka “The Strip.” Much of the local labor force works on the Strip, or one degree removed from it, and the Strip’s culture of consumption bleeds out into the surrounding neighborhoods. In his art, Chavez often explores cultural themes common to the city where he was born. For a piece entitled “Tear Jerker” (shown below), he painted a section of welded metal fencing red, white, and blue, then bent it to make it look like it had been hit by a car—a commentary on Las Vegas’s notorious drunk-driving problem. (A 2024 study showed that Las Vegas is the deadliest city in Nevada for drivers, due to the high number of alcohol-related crashes and deaths.)

I’ll see something I made years ago, and it’s still there… I feel [I’m] a part of the city, because my work is everywhere.”

If the city’s culture can be intense, the desert climate may be even more so. Unlike other materials, metal braces against the dry heat, and it requires less maintenance.

“You don’t see metal fencing in the northern side of the country, because they’ve got more rain, and stuff rusts out… [but] here in the desert, metal’s gonna last a lot longer,” says Chavez.

Las Vegas’s artists and craftspeople require resilience, too, to continue their work in relative solitude, often isolated from recognition, funding, and even from each other. Despite the city’s robust size, there isn’t much support for the arts: In 2025, Assembly Bill 219, which proposed to funnel just 1% of a live entertainment tax on new sports venues to the Nevada Arts Council, was shot down before it even reached the Assembly floor. And the Arts District that was designated in 2016 became gentrified so quickly that local artists, and the galleries that support them, are struggling to keep up with increasingly high rents.

Off the Strip, gated communities are common, and many single-family homes are also guarded by metal security doors, fences, and gates like those made by Chavez. They tend to blend into the surrounding architecture, their craftsmanship often overlooked in a place where so much attention is pointed elsewhere.

“I feel more connected to the community than some do,” says Chavez, “because I’m adding things to their homes. When I’m out installing my work, I’ll see something I made years ago, and it’s still there… I feel [I’m] a part of the city, because my work is everywhere.”