Meet Jamaal, Sean, Steven & Leron or RAREHOUSE

Today we’d like to introduce you to Jamaal, Sean, Steven & Leron or RAREHOUSE.

Jamaal, Sean, Steven and LeRon, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
Rarehouse is a nonprofit organization/brand that was established in 2016, we started off having a 30-day lease for a storefront in Columbus, Ohio and then moved to LA shortly after. Rarehouse is mostly known for our music events providing a platform for upcoming artists of all genres and mediums before they become bigger artists like Post Malone, 21 Savage, Playboi Carti, XXXtentacion, etc. The Summer of 2017, we signed a month to month lease and opened ‘RAREHOUSE’ the venue. The LA band scene adopted us changing our space into more of a boys n girls club for developing artists while utilizing our platform to raise awareness on social issues. Since then, we’ve had three different venue locations but we’ve recently relocated to downtown LA in the Fashion District.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
There has been plenty of bumps and potholes in our journey. After nine months at our 1st space, we learned from city officials our space was illegally constructed and we had to evacuate the building immediately causing us to have to find another unit and switch all of our activities in a few days. Honestly, we were facing major challenges as a space. A month before the pandemic, we held an event showcasing some independent artist, unfortunately the ceiling in the unit underneath us was damaged and we were unable to utilize the building. This process was long and frustrating dealing with our insurance company and upcoming events and classes. A few days before the pandemic, we met with our landlord and made an agreement that we would use another unit that was a bigger one story space so all seemed well. Throughout all that chaos, we were working on a monthly community festival in the parking lot of our space focusing on upcoming and local artists, musicians, skaters and vendors. As far as how COVID affected the trajectory of everything we got goin on, it didn’t stop shit it just slowed things down a little bit. That’s all.

Please tell us about RAREHOUSE.
RAREHOUSE is venue/brand specializing in providing a platform for creators of all mediums, ages, etc. 50% of people know us for booking numerous platinum artists before fame the other 50% know us for being place for diy/underground art to be displayed. The thing that sets us apart from any other venue is that we curate 75% of the events that happen at our space we are a collective of 20+ artists from all over the country that operates as a family more than anything. We represent and are involved with almost every race although we are black-owned under the age of 35 here for the art and the people more than money.

Is there a characteristic or quality that you feel is essential to success?
Humility, compassion and responsibility. We deal with a lot of different people which puts us in a place to learn about different walks of life but we’ve learned everyone has a special quality or circumstance and it’s important to respect everyone. We want to be regarded as a safe place for our community dealing with young artists and young people in general it’s up to us to guide and protect the future the youth.

Contact Info:

• Address: 711 e 9th pl. Los Angeles CA 90021
• Website: rarehouse.la
• Email: RAR3HOUSE@GMAIL.COM
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rar3house/?hl=en
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RAREHOUSELA
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/RAR3HOUSE?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor

Image Credit:
Sebastian Beltran

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