Roller-Skating Is Having (Another) Moment

Roller skating has exploded in Southern California in recent years, and nowhere is that more evident than Long Beach.

“It grew exponentially during the pandemic,” says Michelle “Estro Jen” Steilen, founder and lead executive officer of Moxi Skates , a local brand selling fashionable skates, gear, apparel and accessories that launched in 2008. “Rollerblading was the big thing for many years, and I knew that there would be a big resurgence.”

Indeed, Moxi — whose skates are ethically made, hand-stitched and many sourced in the U.S. — has gained a million new participants since COVID, and Steilen, a seasoned roller derby skater, points to the annual body-positive Sun’s Out Buns Out rollout, which draws some 1,000 skaters to the Strand every summer, as an example of roller-skating’s local impact. “Long Beach is a diverse city,” says Steilen, a native of Philadelphia. “And it's a flat city — I didn't have a car for the first six years that I lived here.”

Moxi joined a robust retail community on and around 4th St. which welcomed new brands and businesses. Removing that barrier of entry is key, Steilen believes, in attracting a multi-generational audience to roller-skating as a leisure activity sand as exercise.

“Working out and that whole industry of improving your body, it's not welcoming,” she says. “There's not much of a community. You need a special outfit for it; You need a membership. It's not freaking fun! And with roller-skating, whether you're doing it outside by yourself listening to your own music, or meeting up with friend at the beach or going to a roller rink, the wind is always blowing because you're propelled by your own volition. ... You accidentally stumble into a healthy, happy lifestyle because you're moving your body, doing something you enjoy doing.”

Still, while skate parks dot the shoreline from Venice to Manhattan Beach to Newport, and blacktops and roller rinks provide refuge from board-heavy ramps, roller-skating has a way to go to catch up with its big brothers skateboarding and surfing as an “official” sport (it borrows elements of both in naming its moves). Steilen hopes for future inclusion in the X Games or the Olympics, but also sees roller-skating as an art form and a model of inclusivity.

“We have trans visibility, and it’s a very let-your-flag-fly type of community,” she says. “You can be anyone. You can change yourself and you will be accepted. It’s really about putting a spirit on wheels and enjoying the wind in your hair.”