PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- The former home of National Grid and the old gas company is now downtown's newest apartment complex.
Although not completed, a grand opening of the historic building on Dorrance Street was held Wednesday with House Speaker Gordon Fox, Mayor Angel Taveras and others in attendance.
The $20-million project by owner Vince Geoffroy, of New York, and local developer David Corsetti turns the building and adjoining Teste Building - a skinny structure built in 1860 on the corner of Dorrance and Weybosset Streets - into 56 luxury apartments, three restaurants (including one on the roof), a 60-car garage and a dry cleaner.
Forty apartments in the Providence G Building, which is it what it's being called, are already leased and 25 are already occupied.
"This is a great day," said Taveras, "because we get a chance to see economic development at work."
Said Fox, "This is exactly what the city of Providence needs - adapting our historic fabric into great uses."