title: Serving static files from the project directory in Django
body: <p>I have the following project structure:</p>
  
  <pre><code>myproject
      - myapp
      - manage.py
      - myproject
            - settings.py
            - urls.py
            ...
      - static
      - templates
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I want to serve all my static files from within this static folder. In my <strong>settings.py</strong>, I have the following:</p>
  
  <pre><code>STATIC_URL = '/static/'
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>However, in one of my templates, when I call static files using the following...</p>
  
  <pre><code>{% load static %}
  ...
  &lt;link href="{% static 'css/styles.css' %}" rel="stylesheet" /&gt;
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>...nothing gets loaded.</p>
  
  <p>However, if I add the css file within myapp/static/css/styles.css, then everything works properly. How can I serve static files from my project root folder? Thanks for any help.</p>