DETROIT (WXYZ) — "I feel like I'm home when I come in here," said Warick Richardson, owner of Tailored Detroit on Gratiot Avenue. "And the most gratifying feeling is, when family and friends come to visit, they say the same thing."
But around 2:30 one morning a vandal targeted the store in Eastern Market. Another business owner, who lives above their own store, heard a commotion, looked outside, and saw someone delivering the last blow to a window of Tailored Detroit.
Thankfully, they were able to scare the vandal off before they damaged more of Warick's dream.
After working for a men's clothing store for 32 years, Warick, who is also a tailor, now owns his own store.
"If I'm being honest, I was livid," said Warick as he sat near the sewing machine where he's made over 1,000 masks in the last few months.
"I put a lot of hard work into getting this open, and we've been through the ups and downs of the shutdown, and to have this happen, yeah, it was a little upsetting."
With the help from Brittany Galeas, Managing Director at Tailored Detroit, Warick swept up the broken glass, as well as the chunks of concrete used by the vandal to bust the window, and then he prepared to spend the night in the store.
"I sat right there at that table and tried to go to sleep and I couldn't," he said. "My mind is just racing and racing. And to, kind of, temper my anger level, I literally was thinking how can I turn this around."
It's the same lesson he'd taught his three daughters.
"I've always taught them when something bad happens there's always something connected to it that's positive. You just have to find it."
Warick then decided he'd hire a nearby artist at Cyberoptix to turn the broken pieces into beautiful cufflinks and lapel pins made of glass, stone, and copper.
The collection is called SIX13 for June 13, the day of the vandalism, and the same day Warick found the silver lining in what had happened.
He's donating 100% of the proceeds of each item sold to the Pope Francis Center to help people in need of food.
"They have a large database of families in the Detroit area that are, literally, dependent, now more than ever, on grocery items and hopefully we can raise a significant amount of money to contribute to that."
Tailored Detroit in Eastern Market is open by appointment only, but the items for sale in the SIX13 collection are also available on tailoreddetroit.com.
"Come and check us out," said Warick. "Have a cup of coffee. Have a drink with us and get to know us because we're going to be here for a while."
