This issue stuck with me for hours until I reviewed the Django documentation: https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/4.1/howto/static-files/

Additionally, ensure that the 'static' directory, where all of your static files will be stored and organised in subdirectories, is placed at the root of your project or app, not two levels below it. It should be placed at level as your "manage.py" and "db.sqlite3" file. This resolved the issue for me and made it easy to arrange files.