At ecoRI, Frank Carini has a story about an unusual ambition.
“Julian Forgue’s life, at least his professional one, revolves around food,” writes Carini. “He owns the popular restaurant Julians on Broadway [in Providence], just opened Pizza J a street over on Westminster, operates a catering business and has a food bus. The foodie would like to add a vertical garden/indoor farming operation to his food pyramid. …
“The longtime restaurateur even has a piece of property in mind: the former Head Start school on Almy Street, at the corner of Meader Street.
“The derelict three-story building has been wasting away for years, but thanks to the vision of city officials and ambitious urban farmers the pavement surrounding the 90,000-square foot property has been growing food for the past three years. Forgue would like to do the same inside. …
“Forgue said he has been intrigued by the idea of vertical farming for about a decade. … [He] has had very preliminary discussions with a city official who didn’t shoot down the idea. That’s a start.
“ ‘It’s not necessarily about making money, but drawing action around growing more local food in inner-city neighborhoods,’ Forgue said. ‘It’s about the action of proof and showing projects like this can be done. There’s energy out there for this. We can’t just keep opening up restaurants and bars.’ ” More here.
The article was made possible with support from the Horsley Witten Group. Did want the same piece of information that I felt was missing? What happened to the Head Start school?
Photo: Joanna Detz/ecoRI News
A Providence restaurant owner would like to see this vacant building at the corner of Almy and Meader streets turned into a vertical farm. An urban farmer is already growing food outside the former Head Start school.
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