We Keep Losing Our Third Spaces
(And This One Hurts)
This week, Condé Nast announced they’re merging Teen Vogue into Vogue.
And I’ve been sitting with this news for days, trying to figure out why it hit me so hard.
Because here’s the thing — I’m 31. I haven’t picked up a Teen Vogue in years. But when I heard the news, I felt it in my chest. Like losing something I didn’t realize I was still holding onto.
Teen Vogue was the only magazine my parents actively paid for me to have a subscription to.
Every month, I’d wait for it to show up in the mailbox. That glossy cover. The smell of fresh ink and perfume samples. The promise of something bigger than my everyday life.
I was the only young woman in my immediate family — no sisters, no built-in guide to navigate what it meant to be a girl becoming a woman. Teen Vogue became that guide.
It taught me about fashion, yes. But it also taught me about feminism, politics, identity, and the world beyond New Orleans. Growing up in a primarily African-American, middle-class-to-poor neighborhood, it was easy to get stuck in your bubble. Teen Vogue showed me there was so much more out there.
The diversity on those pages? Unmatched. I saw myself reflected back in ways I didn’t see anywhere else. I saw what was possible. I saw women who looked like me doing things I didn’t even know I could dream about.
Here’s a memory I keep coming back to:
Me and my god sister used to make purses out of old Teen Vogue magazines.
We’d clip out our favorite images and headlines after we’d read each issue cover to cover. Then we’d take manila envelopes and carefully arrange the clippings, sealing them with tape so nothing would peel off. Little Teen Vogue wallets filled with our favorite things — fashion spreads, bold headlines, faces that looked like ours.
It was our way of keeping the magic alive. Of holding onto the feeling those pages gave us.
That was connection. That was creativity. That was a third space.
And here’s what makes this even harder:
Teen Vogue wasn’t just for teens anymore. It was growing up with us.
Over the past few years, it became more political, more intersectional, more real. It was following millennials and older Gen Z into adulthood, tackling the issues we actually care about — climate change, reproductive rights, economic justice, mental health.
It was becoming a third space for us as adults. A place where we could stay informed, feel seen, and know we weren’t alone in caring about the world.
And now it’s gone.
This is part of a bigger pattern.
When I was growing up, there were so many spaces designed for teens and tweens:
Limited Too
Rave Girl
Teen Nick
Disney Channel (back when it was actually good)
The N (Noggin’s teen programming block)
Teen Vogue
Spaces where young people — especially young women — could gather, explore, figure out who they wanted to be.
And one by one, they’ve all disappeared.
We’re not just losing Teen Vogue. We’re losing all the third spaces that used to exist for young people. And by extension, we’re losing ours too — because those spaces were supposed to grow with us.
This is why I started CREEW .
Because when the third spaces disappear — when the magazines shut down, when the stores close, when the TV networks rebrand, when the gathering places vanish — we have to build new ones.
We can’t wait for corporations to create spaces for us. We have to do it ourselves.
We have to be intentional about creating places where young women (and all people) can gather, explore ideas, see themselves reflected, and feel less alone.
That’s what Teen Vogue was for me as a teenager. That’s what I want CREEW to be for people now.
So yeah, I’m grieving Teen Vogue.
But I’m also more committed than ever to building the spaces our generation deserves.
The ones that won’t disappear when a company decides the margins aren’t high enough.
The ones we own. The ones we protect. The ones we show up to again and again because we choose to, not because an algorithm tells us to.
If you’re grieving too, I see you.
And if you’re ready to build something new with me, I’m here.
Let’s not let this be just another loss. Let’s let it be a reminder of why this work matters.
— Allena