Johnny Gianfrancesco: Louis - Co-Owner and operator of Louis Restaurant.  - Born and raised in Providence.  - On working with his brother (the other owner) : “My brother is the easiest fellow to work with. He does everything I say, it’s wonderful. He’s perfect.”   - The kinds of customers that come into Louis:  “It changes over the years. It’s changing. I’m glad we have that little niche (college students). I like when they melt. We used to have a lot of workers, and when the economy changed there’s no workers like before. There used to be quite a mix, and people would mix here and really get along. We liked that, a lot.” - Where he would like to see Louis 10-20 years down the line: ” This is fine. If we just keep going like this. I like it… I always said I would like to open late again.” 

Johnny Gianfrancesco: Louis

- Co-Owner and operator of Louis Restaurant. 

- Born and raised in Providence. 

- On working with his brother (the other owner) : “My brother is the easiest fellow to work with. He does everything I say, it’s wonderful. He’s perfect.”  

- The kinds of customers that come into Louis: 

“It changes over the years. It’s changing. I’m glad we have that little niche (college students). I like when they melt. We used to have a lot of workers, and when the economy changed there’s no workers like before. There used to be quite a mix, and people would mix here and really get along. We liked that, a lot.”

- Where he would like to see Louis 10-20 years down the line: ” This is fine. If we just keep going like this. I like it… I always said I would like to open late again.” 

Johnny Gianfrancesco: Louis - Co-Owner and operator of Louis Restaurant.  - Born and raised in Providence.  - On working with his brother (the other owner) : “My brother is the easiest fellow to work with. He does everything I say, it’s wonderful. He’s perfect.”   - The kinds of customers that come into Louis:  “It changes over the years. It’s changing. I’m glad we have that little niche (college students). I like when they melt. We used to have a lot of workers, and when the economy changed there’s no workers like before. There used to be quite a mix, and people would mix here and really get along. We liked that, a lot.” - Where he would like to see Louis 10-20 years down the line: ” This is fine. If we just keep going like this. I like it… I always said I would like to open late again.” 

Johnny Gianfrancesco: Louis

- Co-Owner and operator of Louis Restaurant. 

- Born and raised in Providence. 

- On working with his brother (the other owner) : “My brother is the easiest fellow to work with. He does everything I say, it’s wonderful. He’s perfect.”  

- The kinds of customers that come into Louis: 

“It changes over the years. It’s changing. I’m glad we have that little niche (college students). I like when they melt. We used to have a lot of workers, and when the economy changed there’s no workers like before. There used to be quite a mix, and people would mix here and really get along. We liked that, a lot.”

- Where he would like to see Louis 10-20 years down the line: ” This is fine. If we just keep going like this. I like it… I always said I would like to open late again.” 

Posted 1 year ago View high resolution

About:

This semester I joined the class project for ENVS 1560-Sustenance and Sustainability, which is in the process creating a foodshed map of Providence.

My group collected oral histories, through interviews, of Providence food workers. With the addition of their voices and stories we hope to better contextualize the quantitative data and, ultimately, provide a more complete picture of the Providence fooshed.

I interviewed workers, ranging from owners to servers, from two restaurants, Abyssinia and Louis. This blog presents the findings from these interviews and also more detailed information about our project as a whole.

Please enjoy!

Following: