Cars lined up outside an art studio in eastern Los Angeles on Sunday morning, packed with boxes of feminine care products, pimple patches, skincare, clothes, underwear, makeup and more. Some volunteers had driven for hours to support a unique mutual aid effort.
As fires in Los Angeles continue to rage, people across the city are springing into action to meet the needs of the thousands of families who have been displaced. Among the dozens of clothing donation and bottled water distribution sites, Altadena Girls – a new organization started by 14-year-old Avery Colvert – has struck a chord with its focus on teen girls’ recovery.
“I was thinking about, if I lost everything in my own bedroom, how would I feel?” Colvert said. “My clothes and my makeup and my shoes, and everything I have, that’s my identity and that’s my sense of self and that’s how so many other teenagers feel, and they don’t have any of that.”
As volunteers sorted through dozens of donations on Sunday, they organized items into sections for makeup, skincare, bras and underwear, clothing, haircare and jewelry throughout the makeshift boutique, ordering everything by size beside a full-length mirror. The group had also brought in stylists to help girls select outfits and match their makeup shades and select clothes.
“I want a place where people can shop and get all these items for free and it’s all brand-new clothes, shoes, makeup, hair products,” Colvert said. “I want these girls to feel confident in themselves again and to feel normalcy in a time where nothing else is normal for them.”
Colvert and her family moved from Nashville to Altadena four years ago. “We lost our house in a flash flood right before we moved there, so we have that perspective of understanding what it’s like to lose everything,” Lauren Sandidge, Colvert’s mother, said. Though they later moved to the neighboring city of Pasadena, she and her younger brother stayed active in the Altadena community, continuing to attend its schools. Colvert and her brother’s schools have suffered immense damage from the Eaton fire, which began last Tuesday amid high winds. Colvert said that many of her friends had been forced to evacuate their home in the middle of the night with just the clothes they were sleeping in.
Colvert’s stepfather, Matt Chait, said that she immediately wanted to offer help. “She was feeling some sort of survivor’s guilt, and asking: ‘Can I give all my clothes to my friends?’” Chait said. He told her that was “‘only going to go so far. The way you do this is you create a ripple. You get other people to give stuff, they have more than you.’”
Altadena Girls is currently being hosted at a gallery space where Chait and Sandidge work in the Boyle Heights neighborhood, about 40 minutes from the area hardest hit by the Eaton fire. “We needed a place to make it look nice,” Chait said. “The goal is to give these girls a boutique shopping experience. They’ve already lost everything. I really don’t want them digging through bins.”
Even though Altadena Girls started just four days ago, already it has exploded in size – especially after stars including Paris Hilton and Charli xcx promoted it online. Now the group’s Instagram has more than 40,000 followers. So many volunteers showed up on Sunday that they had to turn some away. Brands and celebrities have reached out to send more products. Local restaurants have stepped in to cater for volunteers.
Grace Balmet, a community wellness specialist for teenagers and one of the first volunteers to show up, said the organization’s message immediately resonated with her. “We want people to feel like people and not just receiving ends of flurries of aid,” Balmet said.
Alice Fothergill, a professor at the University of Vermont and disaster sociologist, said Altadena Girls was a perfect example of the ways in which younger people, particularly teenagers, are able to identify overlooked, specific needs in their communities.
Balmet said: “One of things that’s really common in disaster relief is projecting: ‘What would I want?’” But, she added, “this is a really special place for us to learn as a whole to really listen and meet a need there.”
Lummani Crowder, whose family recently lost their home to the Eaton fire, came in to shop for her daughters aged 12 and nine, and her 14-year-old niece after a former co-worker sent her the organization’s flyer. She was able to fill three bags full of bras, socks, hair ties, deodorant, shoes, jackets, sweatpants, toothbrushes, purses, and even pens and papers to help her girls continue school remotely.
“Right now it’s just about building and starting from scratch,” she said. “I am very humbled and just in awe of what I’ve seen here today.”
Altadena Girls is working with local social workers to make sure all girls are able to find transportation to get to the shop. Next, the organization is looking to find a space closer to their community in Pasadena, using a physical space to help displaced girls maintain their community.
Colvert sees this as just the beginning. “Eventually, I would like this to be big. It’s already big as it is, so I feel like there’s really no option almost than to make it something better.”
