Thayer Street, Providence: What’s There and a Bit of History

Thayer Street is the main commercial street of College Hill on Providence’s East Side, right beside Brown University. It’s the go-to street for students from Brown, RISD and the area’s other schools, lined with independent shops and plenty of places to eat.

What to do on Thayer Street

• Catch a movie at the Avon Cinema, 260 Thayer Street: a single-screen, 486-seat Art Deco theater that opened in February 1938 and has been run by the same family ever since. It shows independent, art house and foreign films.
• Eat and browse. Since the mid-2000s more and more of the street’s storefronts have become restaurants and cafés, alongside independent shops.
• Walk to Benefit Street. A few blocks downhill, Benefit Street has the 18th- and 19th-century houses College Hill is known for.

How did Thayer Street get its name?

It was laid out in 1799 as Cross Street and renamed in 1823 for Dr. Thayer, a great-great-grandson of Providence founder Roger Williams. The Thayer Street Grammar School, built in 1866–67, once stood at the corner of Thayer and Meeting Streets.

More around here: Fox Point and the East Side and Wickenden Street.

Sources: Wikipedia, Thayer Street, Wikipedia, Avon Cinema.