Southside Community Land Trust
Rooting a Food Hub in the Neighborhood It Serves
Southside Community Land Trust had just completed a $3.5 million rehabilitation of a historic 1850s livery building at 404 Broad Street in Providence — transforming it into a full-service community food hub with a produce packing center, commercial kitchen, office and classroom space, and storefronts for three Black-owned food businesses. The building needed signage that could hold its own: clear enough to guide first-time visitors, considered enough to match the care put into the renovation, and grounded enough to feel like it belonged to the South Providence neighborhood surrounding it.
The Challenge
A building doing this many things at once — produce distribution, retail, food production, youth programming, organizational headquarters — requires signage that works at every scale. Exterior sign types had to navigate Providence permitting along a gateway corridor between downtown and Upper South Providence. Inside, the wayfinding had to serve farmers dropping off produce, community members visiting the market, students coming for programming, and businesses operating out of the rental suites — often at the same time.
Our Approach
We started with a site survey and a conversation about who walks through those doors. SCLT’s mission is straightforward: they help people grow food. The signage had to carry that same clarity. We developed a sign type plan that covered the full building — exterior identification, entry directories, suite identification, program space labeling, and interior directional — then coordinated permitting and selected fabrication partners whose finish work matched the quality of Union Studio’s renovation. Every sign decision ran through one question: does this make the building easier for the community to use?
The Result
A complete interior and exterior signage system installed ahead of the building’s public opening. Exterior signs establish SCLT’s presence on Broad Street and connect pedestrians to the adjacent Somerset Hayward urban youth farm. Interior wayfinding moves visitors naturally through a building with a lot happening at once. The system is designed to grow with the organization — new suite tenants and program spaces can be added without starting over.
Client
Southside Community Land Trust
Location
Providence, RI
Date
2024-2026
Industry
Nonprofit
Scope
Custom interior code and wayfinding signage, exterior tenant signage, custom fence art panels
Partner
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