Vintage store in Warnors Center in downtown Fresno burglarized. ‘A huge loss’
A vintage clothing shop in the Warnors Theatre building was broken into early Saturday morning, putting the owner out thousands of dollars in damage and inventory loss.
Located on the Tuolumne Street side of the Warnors Center, Summoned Clothing is one of the six tenants occupying the nearly 100-year-old theater complex in downtown Fresno. The complex reached full occupancy of six tenants in April after historically struggling with turnover.
Vanessa Gonzalez, who owns the vintage store, said that cameras caught what she thought to be an unhoused man forcibly breaking through the door with bricks around 5:30 a.m. Saturday.
Once inside, the man started taking clothes off the racks and bringing piles to his cart on the street before returning to grab more, Gonzalez said.
While the store was not completely vandalized aside from the broken door, Gonzalez said she estimates the man stole nearly $1,000 of merchandise, pieces that Gonzalez carefully sources to sell at Summoned Clothing.
The cost of repairing the door, Gonzalez said, was nearly the same as the stolen merchandise.
Gonzalez has been selling ‘90s and Y2K-era inspired clothing out of the Warnors Center location for the past three years. The clothing, she says, comes from thrift stores, yard sales, and estate sales, even sometimes from out of town if they have pieces that fit the criteria she has for the shop.
Additionally, a bulk of what was stolen was bottoms and skirts, pieces that Gonzalez said are popular come summer.
“I feel a huge loss on my part right now, just because I don’t have that much inventory of that selection anymore,” she said.
Some commenters on an Instagram post announcing the break-in encouraged Gonzalez to start a GoFundMe, but she said she would rather their money be spent buying pieces for themselves to support the shop.
“I feel like that’s for when people desperately need it, and fortunately, I’m not in that position,” Gonzalez said. “I just know the community will show out this week because of what happened.”
Summoned Clothing will reopen Tuesday outside their usual Wednesday to Sunday schedule because of the revenue loss.
“I’ve always felt super comfortable where Warnors is, especially just because I run the shop on my own as a woman,” she said, “but I guess from this point forward, we’ll just take better precautions.”