Thursday, September 3, 2026

Pasadena’s Side Street Projects Opens Free Six-Week After-School Woodworking Series for Kids at Altadena’s Loma Alta Park Sept. 9

[Courtesy of Side Street Projects]

The artist-run nonprofit, which is searching for a new executive director as Emily Hopkins steps down after nearly 17 years, also sets a Sept. 13 community day with a mixed-media self-portrait workshop

Families can sign their children up for a free, six-week after-school woodworking series that Pasadena’s Side Street Projects will run on Wednesday afternoons beginning Sept. 9 at Loma Alta Park in Altadena, the temporary home of the Altadena Library, the artist-run nonprofit announced Thursday.

The series, offered in partnership with the Altadena Library, meets Sept. 9, 16, 23 and 30 and Oct. 7 and 14 at the park, 3330 N. Lincoln Ave. Families can choose one of two hour-long slots, 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. or 4:45 to 5:45 p.m., and children are expected to attend all six sessions, particularly the first, according to the organization’s September newsletter.

Working only with hand tools, students choose from project templates including cars, animals and planes and build them from scratch while learning to sand, saw, shape, drill, set screws, use clamps, hammer and incise, the newsletter said. Each class is capped at 15 students, and participants take home the wooden toys they make. The program is open to children ages 5 through 15; younger children are not permitted. Registration is at https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.sidestreet.org/classes/ww-six-weeks&source=gmail&ust=1788564747597000&sa=E.

Side Street Projects also announced its September Community Day on Sunday, Sept. 13, in Altadena, with the exact location shared upon registration. Teaching artist Nandi will lead an all-ages mixed-media self-portrait skillshare from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., and a one-day youth woodworking workshop for ages 5 to 15, limited to 15 students, runs from 10 a.m. to noon. Registration is required for both at https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.sidestreet.org/classes/mixed-media&source=gmail&ust=1788564747597000&sa=E and https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.sidestreet.org/classes/ww-onsite-9-13&source=gmail&ust=1788564747597000&sa=E.

The organization’s August skillshare, a plein air watercolor session led by Altadena artist Keni Arts, sent participants home with watercolor kits, and Side Street has posted the artist’s takeaway guide to painting outdoors at https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.sidestreet.org/skillshares-with-side-street-projects/2026/8/19/wild-outdoors-with-keni-arts&source=gmail&ust=1788564747597000&sa=E.

The programming arrives during a leadership change. Side Street Projects announced in July that Executive Director Emily Hopkins will transition out this fall after nearly 17 years leading the organization, and its board said in the newsletter that its search for a successor is making progress, with details to come. Hopkins, a California Institute of the Arts graduate, joined the organization as a teaching artist in 2002, took over its woodworking program the following year and has been executive director since 2010, according to a 2019 interview with Voyage LA. She continues to lead the organization through the transition, the newsletter said.

Founded in 1992 by artists Karen Atkinson and Joe Luttrell, Side Street Projects describes itself as a mobile, artist-run organization that supports artists, projects and programs through a do-it-yourself and do-it-together ethos. Its mobile woodworking classes, originally taught from a converted bus, and its My Masterpieces public art program for Pasadena Unified second-graders are among its signature programs, and the organization has said it serves more than 1,000 adults and 4,000 children a year across the Pasadena-Altadena area, according to the Pasadena Community Foundation, which funded its shipping-container classroom in 2016.

More information is available at https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.sidestreet.org/&source=gmail&ust=1788564747597000&sa=E.