ODE TO L.A.
This isn’t fashion, it’s a statement.
Hey Rebels— Pixie here.
Today, July 16, 2025, we dropped the "Ode to L.A." collection. It’s not just a collection of black tees—it’s our refusal to look away. Los Angeles has always been more than a city. It’s a collision of cultures, music, art, struggle, and rebellion. It’s where immigrants built neighborhoods, where rock bands screamed the truth, where murals tell stories the news won’t cover. And right now, it’s a front line again.
In 2025, under the renewed presidential administration, Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations have escalated sharply. In January, DT signed new executive orders expanding interior enforcement priorities to include those without criminal convictions. ICE resumed large-scale workplace raids, conducted sweeps in communities, and began increasing “collateral arrests”—picking up people not named in specific warrants, simply because they were present. By March, reports emerged that ICE was again staking out courthouses, schools, and hospitals. Fear spread fast among immigrant communities, documented and undocumented alike. And in Los Angeles—a sanctuary city by law but vulnerable in reality—the tension is palpable.
This isn’t the first time L.A. has been caught in a web of state power and racialized fear. In the 1930s, during the Great Depression, the U.S. government deported as many as one to two million people of Mexican descent—many of them U.S. citizens—under so-called “repatriation drives.” Raids swept through L.A. workplaces, parks, and neighborhoods. Families were loaded onto trains and buses, forced across the border, sometimes without ever having seen Mexico. In the 1940s, the Zoot Suit Riots unfolded in L.A., where servicemen attacked young Mexican American men for wearing flamboyant suits deemed “un-American,” and police arrested the victims instead of the perpetrators. In the 1980s and 1990s, waves of Central American refugees fleeing U.S.-backed wars faced detention and deportation. Despite legal asylum claims, many were sent back to violence and death. And after 9/11, communities in L.A. watched Muslim and South Asian neighbors detained and disappeared into secretive federal dragnets. History repeats because power finds new names for old tools: “Public charge.” “Illegals.” “Secure Communities.” “Operation Wetback.” Now, “mass deportations.”
2025 policies echo the past. ICE conducted several raids across Southern California this spring, arresting hundreds and scaring thousands more into staying home from work, church, or school. In May alone, over 2,400 people were detained nationwide in workplace operations, the highest monthly number since 2019. ICE has resumed using data from DMV records, utility bills, and cell phone location data. Even sanctuary policies can’t fully shield people when federal surveillance penetrates private life. ICE detention capacity has increased, with new private contracts signed for facilities in Adelanto and Bakersfield. Advocates report overcrowding, lack of medical care, and increased solitary confinement. And as of June 2025, the administration imposed further restrictions on asylum eligibility, reminiscent of “Remain in Mexico.” People arriving at the border are being turned away, detained, or pushed into fast-track deportation. All of it fuels fear—but also resistance.
Los Angeles refuses to be silent. Organizations like CHIRLA, CARECEN, Immigrant Defenders Law Center, and dozens of grassroots groups are fighting every day to keep families together and communities safe. They organize rapid response networks. They train people to know their rights. They show up at courthouses and detention centers. And artists—like those of us at Grunge Luxe—do what we do best: speak truth. Create. Push back.
The Ode to L.A. drop carries these truths on our sleeves: No More Cages. We Won’t Be Silent. FCK Your Borders. Never Illegal. We Stay. We Fight. We Are the Line. Fear Isn’t Justice. You Can’t Erase Us.
This city made us fierce. We’ve been here before, and we know how to fight back—with art, with truth, with solidarity. This drop is for those who stand tall when the world wants them small. For those whose roots run deep across lines someone else drew on a map. It’s for Los Angeles. And for everyone who refuses to be erased.
We don’t run. We rise.