Morris Clothes Shoppe

About this Property

#Redevelopment

This former nightclub building on a triangular lot has been surrounded by the recent construction of Emblem 125. For a little while, we thought this building was going to be demolished for a much larger apartment building.

It is a very positive development to see this building restored instead of removed. The Jewelry District in general has had many new apartment units added with recent projects — the aforementioned Emblem 125, Chestnut Commons, and smaller projects like the Richmond Residences. This project adds only six new units, but it saves a historic piece of street front architecture when so much around it has been updated with new construction.

#Current Events

The building has been converted into six apartment units with plans to add ground-floor retail or a restaurant.

#History

From “Downtown Providence: Statewide Historical Preservation Report P-P-5,” prepared by the RIHPHC, May 1981

Morris Clothes Shoppe (ca. 1926-1928): This building is a large, rectangular, two-story, five-by-five bay, flat roofed, brick building with a pale-yellow brick veneer façade. There are several recessed entrances along Richmond and Friendship Streets with various types of modern metal and wood doors with fixed window panes. The original storefront windows with transoms above have been blacked out, covered over with wood, or replaced with modern, metal-framed windows. Below the storefront windows are green marble and wood panels that cover the brick foundation and basement windows. The primary entrance has a modern, metal door flanked by two, fixed-pane windows and is set back within a clipped corner bay at the intersection of Friendship and Richmond Streets. At each entrance, there is a decorative, green and white hexagon-tile floor, in some of which the tiles have been set to say “Morris 101.” A small, recessed entrance on Friendship Street appears to have an original, fixed, square, multi-pane transom. The building has a decorative parapet and cornice with dentils that extend around the Richmond and Friendship Street elevations. A decorative concrete cornice above the first story storefront bays visually divides the first floor from the second. Between each pair of windows on the second floor is a decorative concrete capital at the cornice. There is a large, modern fire escape on the east elevation that ascends to the second floor.

This building appears in the 1926 Providence Atlas Book as 101 Richmond Street, Morris Clothes Shoppe. However, in the 1926-27 City Directory, Morris Clothes Shoppe is shown as occupying 91 and 93 Richmond Street. By 1927-28, neither 91 nor 93 Richmond Street, on the corner of Richmond and Friendship Streets, was listed. This suggests that these buildings were removed for the construction of the new Morris Clothes Shoppe at 101 Richmond Street. In January 1923, Morris Beranbaum, of Morris Clothes Shoppe, purchased this lot. He most likely built 101 Richmond Street between 1926 and 1928. This building is currently occupied by several nightclubs and bars.

#In the News

JWU sells former Karma property to alumnus; $3M mixed-use apartment project planned

by Marc Larocque
Providence Business News | September 21, 2021

A former downtown nightclub that was shut down following a double shooting in January 2014 and a neighboring parking lot were sold for $1.6 million last week by Johnson & Wales University to an alumnus who plans to turn the properties into a mixed-use apartment building, according to city property records.

That price tag was the same amount the school paid seven years ago for the former Karma nightclub property at 101 Richmond St. and the parking lot, with the idea that they could be developed into additional classrooms, administrative offices, a gym or a student services center.

The properties in the Jewelry District were sold to 101 Richmond LLC and 138 Friendship LLC, registered to Providence Realty Advisors LLC and its owner Dustin Dezube, who received an associate degree from Johnson & Wales in 2007.

Dezube, who is the owner of the Providence Student Living Capital LLC, which manages more than 100 apartment in the city, said he plans a $3 million renovation of the 101 Richmond St. property into 19 one- and two-bedroom apartment units, with a local bar operator that’s being lined up for a first floor retail space, with an outdoor deck for a patio. Dezube said the project isn’t ready to announce the name of the bar operator yet.

No plans are in place for the other first floor retail space, Dezube said.

The timeline to complete the project is about 18 to 20 months, Dezube said. He added Providence Architecture, a firm he co-owns with architect Kevin Diamond, is behind the design for the project.

“I’m very passionate about the city,” Dezube said. “I’ve admired that building since I first saw it. It’s a beautiful old, historic building, and it has so much potential. I really like the brick facade and I also think the Jewelry District is an exciting, happening place, with a lot of new development. It’s an area I want to be in.”

Prior to JWU buying the property in 2014, the 101 Richmond St. building and parking lot were small parts of a proposed $60 million student housing development planned by the Dallas-based Lincoln Property Co. and Phoenix Property Co. But those plans fell apart, and the former owners Richmond and Friendship LLC approached JWU, which agreed to buy the property for $1.6 million. […]

Captured 24 August 2026 from https://pbn.com/jwu-sells-former-karma-property-to-alumnus-3m-mixed-use-apartment-project-planned/