In this paper, the state estimator design problem of interval type-2 Takagi–Sugeno fuzzy systems suffering from bounded disturbances is studied. To enhance the resilience of the estimator, a non-fragile design scheme is proposed to tackle the estimator gain variations. Meanwhile, an event-triggered communication mechanism is introduced for relieving the transmission burden over networks. To settle down the non-fragile estimator design issue subject to bounded disturbances and event-induced error, we propose a new definition of quadratic boundedness via the multiple Lyapunov functions. Based on this definition, a novel co-design method of estimator and event generator for fuzzy system models in the presence of both measurable and immeasurable premise variables is presented. In virtue of quadratic boundedness framework, less conservative conditions of the existence and quadratic stability of the fuzzy estimators are obtained, and the upper bound of estimation error is given explicitly. The desired estimator gains are determined by convex optimization technique using slack matrices. Two illustrative examples are exploited to validate the availability and superiority of the addressed design approach.