OUR STORY

Our goal is to make an impact in our communities using creativity as an outlet of service.

Project Ripples is a youth-led nonprofit organization rooted in the belief that creativity is a powerful form of service. Founded with the idea that small acts can create a wide-reaching impact—like ripples in water—we design and deliver free arts programming that empowers young people to express themselves, connect with others, and spark change in their communities. From photography to painting, entrepreneurship to music, our programs use creative mediums to amplify unheard voices and build bridges across age, race, class, and ability.

What makes Project Ripples distinct is that it’s entirely youth-led. Teenagers and young adults aren’t just participating—they’re designing curricula, leading workshops, curating galleries, and building coalitions. We’ve held public exhibitions, arts-based fundraisers, intergenerational painting workshops, and marketplace-style events where young creators launched their first products. Each program is an experiment in joy, dignity, and possibility.

Our past projects include Love Letters, an emotional arts workshop that invited participants to express their love language through mixed-media art, and Todos Tonos, a backyard music festival that doubled as a fundraiser and a platform for young artists to perform. We hosted Self Portraits, a public gallery on Sunset Boulevard, a culmination of a program where we helped kids facing homelessness create artwork about identity and belonging, and hosted Kids Biz, an entrepreneurship program where elementary-age kids created and sold handmade crafts, learning the basics of business and creative confidence along the way. Our most recent program Emotion in Motion brought abstract expressionism to the Pasadena Senior Center, where older adults painted their inner emotional landscapes and exhibited them publicly—bridging generations and reminding the community of the power and relevance of elder voices.

At its core, Project Ripples is about cultivating capacity—within ourselves and each other. We believe that creativity, when nurtured and shared, generates agency. That young people, when trusted and supported, rise. And that community, when built through shared acts of beauty and service, endures.

We invite individuals, organizations, and businesses to partner with us: to volunteer, fund a workshop, offer a space, or simply attend and bear witness to what young people and elders can create when given the chance. In a world that often underestimates the potential of youth and overlooks the wisdom of elders, Project Ripples is a living reminder that both are not just essential—they’re transformative.