Peeling away the years

FRESH COAT: Robert O'Donnell, president and owner of E.F. O'Donnell & Sons, in front of the $800,000 Grace Episcopal Church project his company is currently working on in Providence. The company's work is mainly focused on restoring buildings back to their original look. / PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO
FRESH COAT: Robert O'Donnell, president and owner of E.F. O'Donnell & Sons, in front of the $800,000 Grace Episcopal Church project his company is currently working on in Providence. The company's work is mainly focused on restoring buildings back to their original look. / PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO

There was a time when E.F. O’Donnell & Sons Co. Inc. was known for painting and refinishing commercial office space. Before that, most of its work was painting new bridge components on Rhode Island highways.

But for the past 30 years, churches and other historical properties have been the bread and butter of what is now a fourth-generation family business.

Begun in 1900 in a carriage house in the Olneyville section of Providence, the painting company remains on the same site, although in a more modern building facing Dike Street.

Robert O’Donnell, whose great-grandfather started the company, has worked for the family business since 1980 and became its president nearly 25 years ago.

- Advertisement -

From its origins as a painting contractor, the company has broadened its services to include construction management and the highly specialized skills involved in historical restoration, O’Donnell said.

Its most visible current project, an $800,000 renovation of Grace Episcopal Church in downtown Providence, will carry on through August.

“[Most] of the work we do is to restore it back to its original look,” he said.

In the 1950s and 1960s, when his father and uncle ran the company, the firm had many contracts to paint and repair the applied wall coverings of office buildings in downtown Providence, O’Donnell said.

“A lot of the businesses had family ownership,” he said. “There was a lot of concern about what your business looked like.” In more recent decades, he said, the corporations or multiple owners that control the buildings have wanted painting less regularly, every few years or so.

Over time, the company made historical painting its specialty. The Grace Episcopal Church project, on which E.F. O’Donnell & Sons is serving as both general contractor and painting contractor, is a challenging job, O’Donnell said.

The church, built in 1843, has had water leaking through its metal roof. O’Donnell’s company is painting and sealing the roof and repairing the brownstone exterior as well.

“With a building of that age and size, you open up something that’s a problem and you find out something else going on inside. It can be challenging,” he said.

In terms of the future, he said, the company will keep finding new outlets.

The company has painted several murals, for example, such as the one near the intersection of Route 146 at Interstate 95. The murals, originally designed to counter graffiti, have endured.

“We’ve had some difficult times but when the difficult times have come up, we just had to work that much harder to make it work,” he said. “Diversification. You can’t keep all your eggs in one basket.” •

No posts to display