Supporters had raised nearly $100,000 just days after a three-alarm fire gutted the Southeast Portland business. Author: Katherine Cook Updated: 11:19 PM PDT April 23, 2021
PORTLAND, Ore. It s been a long and devastating week for one Portland business. Fire destroyed Portland Garment Factory on Southeast 79th and Stark early Monday morning. Investigators ruled it arson.
Located in the Montavilla neighborhood, Portland Garment Factory produces clothing and soft goods. Just two days before the fire, owner Britt Howard said she had been feeling extremely positive about work and the future of her business.
“I went home to my husband on Friday and said, ‘I m feeling so creative and alive and actually proud of myself,” recalled Howard. “‘Something is happening. Something is about to change.’ I actually said those words.”
The locally loved, zero-fabric waste studio appears to have lost everything to the flames.
By
Eden Dawn
4/19/2021 at 5:18pm
At 3:30 a.m. on the morning of Monday, April 19, the first calls for a commercial fire came in.
By daybreak, the roof of the Portland Garment Factory in Montavilla was collapsing and the interior was destroyedâsewing machines, fabrics, clothing, gone. KATU reports that more than 70 firefighters were on scene battling the three-alarm fire. No injuries to them, or to anyone inside, but the toll it will take on a beloved local business is immeasurable. People close to the business say they believe there is security camera footage of someone setting the fire from the outside.
Massive fire that gutted Portland Garment Factory was arson, officials say
Updated 7:45 AM;
Today 6:38 AM
A three-alarm fire badly damaged the Portland Garment Factory in Southeast Portland early on the morning of Monday April 19, 2021.
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A large fire that tore through a Southeast Portland textile manufacturing facility Monday morning was set by an arsonist, fire officials said.
The first reports of the blaze came in around 3:30 a.m. at the Portland Garment Factory, located at 408 Southeast 79th Avenue, Portland Fire & Rescue said in a statement.
The first firefighters on the scene saw flames coming from the second story of the building and quickly made their way inside to fight the blaze, officials said.