Name of business: Little Red Door
Type of business: Secondhand boutique
Location: Inside Rustic Roots, 231 E. Main St.
Hours: 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., Monday through Saturday
Contact information: 831-240-7579
Specialty: Affordable fashion
History of business:
A new Turlock business is giving discarded fashions a second chance — and downtown shoppers an affordable boutique experience.
Sisters Marissa Miranda and Isabella Cisneros opened Little Red Door earlier this month, hoping to redefine thrift shopping for the community through a selection of up-cycled clothing hand-picked by the duo. Miranda hopes the new boutique, located inside downtown business Rustic Roots, can bring back quality fabrics and one-of-a-kind items seldom found in chain stores today.
“(Little Red Door) is like walking into your dream closet. It’s filled with nice, quality clothes because we really wanted to raise awareness about how over-manufactured the clothing industry is today...it’s more about quantity over quality, and that craftsmanship just isn’t there anymore,” Miranda said. “We don’t look like a secondhand shop and it doesn’t smell like it. It looks like a boutique until you look at the price tags.”
A full-time teacher at Turlock Christian, Miranda recently moved to Turlock from Monterey. While living on the coast, she and Cisneros, who lives in Santa Cruz, would frequent thrift shops. Now the sisters continue to do so in towns like San Juan Bautista and Murphy’s, but are instead on the hunt for retro fashions they can sell in their shop. From Levi’s jeans to handbags from the 60s, a wide range of style options is available at the store.
“My sister and I have always been close, but this has made us have more time together and has helped our relationship grow even more,” Miranda said.
The store isn’t arranged by type of clothing, but the need for clothing, rather. Racks are labeled by occasion, like work, date night, weekend vibes and even a section for men, ranging in prices anywhere from $5 to $15. While many these days go thrifting in order to resell the clothing for a profit, Little Red Door aims to provide fashion at prices similar to the stores where the items were found. In addition, 10 percent of the shop’s proceeds go toward local nonprofit Prem-maa, which was started by two TC students to help stop human trafficking.
“We want to make sure that it’s not going to cost a fortune to look good,” Miranda said. “Our objective is that anyone can dress nice and should be able to afford it.”
