Irene Chang had spent the last week praying that it wouldn’t rain.
On Saturday, the 25 year-old, born-and-bred Angeleno hosted Los Angeles’s first-ever bakery half-marathon walk – which took place after the city had been experiencing uncharacteristically stormy weather the past several days. Luckily, with some positive manifestation, Chang woke up on Saturday morning to crisp, clear skies and felt immediate relief.
Over the course of seven, very sweet hours, Chang and the walk’s 50 participants walked through Pasadena and Highland Park, stopping at pre-selected bakeries to fuel up and sample treats. The participants strolled, chatted and snapped pictures of their sugary, flaky pastries throughout the day.
The idea for Los Angeles’s first half-marathon bakery walk came about back in October when Chang, who works in tech, went to New York for a work trip. She spent her free time walking her very own personalized half-marathon.
“I’ll just walk half-marathons in Santa Monica, or I’ll plan my own itineraries and hit up multiple different spots that I’ve been wanting to try,” she told the Guardian, noting that while she was in New York, she walked through all five boroughs.
Her trip also coincided with the NYC Bakery Run, which was sponsored by media company Tipster and branded as a “social half-marathon” through Brooklyn and Manhattan, with stops at baked good hotspots such as L’Appartement 4F and Radio Bakery.
Chang returned to Los Angeles inspired by the New York bakery run, but had some tweaks in mind for her own version. Her goal was to focus more on community, less on running. She curated the bakeries on the route, selecting small businesses that had a special relationship to their neighborhoods.
“I want[ed] to hear about the owner, their story and what they’re making, and why [their work] is important to them,” she said.
She began posting on TikTok, gauging local interest in a bakery walk. Her views climbed from 1,500 to 50,000 in a matter of days. When she opened the sign-ups to participants, more than 1,600 people applied for 50 spots. Chang got to work randomly selecting applicants, coordinating logistics, and finalizing the bakeries.
“I’ve been working on this as if it were a full-time job,” she said.
Jiyoon Jang, the owner and head chef of LA bakery Modu Cafe, jumped at the opportunity to participate, in part because she knows what it’s like to turn an idea into a reality.
“I started as a pop-up myself, baking from home and doing all of that before launching into a brick and mortar,” she told the Guardian.
Chang’s ambition to build something from the ground up resonated with Jang, who saw Modu’s participation as a way to support a young entrepreneur and highlight the diversity of Highland Park.
“I’m really excited that people are going to be able to sort of experience Highland Park,” she said.
Other bakery stops along the route included Little Flower, ID-Eclair, Neighbors & Friends, CAR Artisan Chocolate, and Fondry. Each bakery made smaller portions of one of their signature pastries to give out to participants.
Chang’s half-marathon bakery crawl is the latest social media-to-real-life adventure to come to fruition, capitalizing on the popularity of run clubs, dance classes, book clubs, and more group activities to combat the loneliness epidemic, particularly among gen Z.
In 2023, then US surgeon general Vivek Murthy declared that loneliness needed to be a public health priority “on par with tobacco, with substance use disorders, with obesity and other issues that we know profoundly impacted people’s lives”. For young people especially, the Covid pandemic disrupted much of their adolescence and early adulthood – a crucial time for fostering relationships and community.
What began as mindless scrolling for participant and Pasadena resident Camille Nichelini, 29, turned into an opportunity to level up her fitness goals and meet new people. A self-identified introvert, Nichelini was intimidated at going to the walk by herself. But her worries soon abated.
“I left the event with some new friends. We exchanged Instagrams and everything. So that was really cool,” she said.
At each stop along the half-marathon route, Chang conducted a brief interview with a representative from each bakery, where she asked them to explain the pastry they created, their bakery’s mission, and any other notable details about their food.
For participants like Nichelini, the best part of the day was hearing from the bakery employees themselves. Vegan bakery ID-Eclair was her top spot of the day, with its creamy pistachio éclair.
“Honestly, I’ve never had a vegan treat that I’ve enjoyed so much,” she said, noting that she wasn’t just impressed by the food. “The way that the owner [and chef Romuald Guiot] was speaking about [the food], you could tell how passionate he was about it.”
Chang is still recovering from Saturday’s walk and the two months of work that went into it, but that hasn’t stopped her from looking forward. She is hoping to make the Los Angeles bakery half-marathon an annual event but also has her sights set beyond the City of Angels.
“I would love to see this expand to different cities,” she said.
