The Allston Brighton-based group Sisterbridge is hosting a free thrift shop on Sept. 12 from 1:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. at the Presentation Center, 640 Washington St., Brighton.

Sisterbridge Founder Selena Daley said the thrift store is a way to connect multi-racial girls and mono-racial girls. She said the organization comes from a place of building community.

“I saw a gap in the fact that a lot of mixed girls felt out of place, and there weren’t really a lot of resources to help them,” she said. “So we do a lot of programming around talks about colorism, hair events, online discussions about politics and identity, and one thing we discuss is the idea of having a platform and using it.”

Colorism, according to the Oxford Dictionary – https://gvimes.link/clrsm – is the hierarchical rating of persons by the lightness of their skin tone. While historical examples of this are more closely related to racism – sorting people ethnically based on an outdated idea of race – colorism relates to how those ideas still echo down the ages to today, and how it can relate to health outcomes and medical treatment – https://gvimes.link/clrsmrvw

Daley said through their organizing, the group currently has 1,500 followers on TikTok, and she thought since they have that platform, as she said, they should use it to help people. So she said they thought the free thrift store was a good place to start.

“Brands were reaching out about sending PR, but we were like, ‘We want this to go to a good place,’” she said. “Brands sent us brand new hoodies and pajamas for the event, and we also did a drive to collect items for the store. That’s kind of the inspiration behind it. If we have the resources to help, we wanted to help the local community.”

Each thrift store patron will be given a limited number of tickets they can use to pick out what they’d like and make it fair for everybody.

“So no one is being charged for anything, everything is completely free,” she said. “For example, a T-shirt might be one ticket or a rug might be two.”

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Daley said the organization has all its leadership roles currently filled, but volunteers are always welcome.

“We’re open to everyone – we’re not just limited to multi-cultural girls,” she said. “It’s for any girl who’s ever struggled with identity or to fit in, especially when it comes to race.”

Daley said they host colorism talks and have already gone to schools in Watertown and Jamaica Plain. You can sign up to host discussions at the group’s website, https://www.sisterbridgecollective.org/

Daley said the talks and the work are incredibly fun and rewarding.

“When I get home from school, this is what I rush to,” she said. “I love doing this. I have a huge passion for social justice and racial justice, and the stories I’ve heard from girls in this organization and the work we get to do, it brings me so much joy. To see that we’re helping women like this, I mean we get stories from girls telling us they’ve never had anybody to open up to about being stuck between these two worlds. It’s so beautiful.”