Despite arson, fabric business open

WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) — One Wilmington business ravaged by a fire will move into a new building in the new year. The owner says, however, she’s been operating out of her home as she waits for answers from fire investigators.

Dorothy’s Ruffled Originals was destroyed in March; fire officials have ruled the incident was arson, but no arrests have been made.

“They just destroyed everything we had. Everything,” Dorthy Noe said.

Now Noe and her husband continue to pick up the pieces as the investigation continues.

“The money that we would have had from the sale of all of our things would have been our retirement,” Noe said.

Since the fire, Noe has been operating the business out of her home. The custom fabric business does a lot of their sales through catalogs, but the fire continues to hurt business.

“So many people think we’re out of business and it has just been such a downer for us,” Noe said.

Noe said when the fire was set, they were two weeks away from moving out of the building. They plan on moving the business to a shopping complex on Wrightsville Avenue next year.