The nation's largest shaving manufacturer has a new plan for its campus in Boston's Fort Point neighborhood focused on housing and public waterfront access.
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Gillette filed a letter of intent with Boston's Planning Department to redevelop its 31-acre Gillette World Shaving Headquarters in South Boston to include housing, public open space and other commercial uses.
The redevelopment comes after Gillette parent company Proctor & Gamble in October announced plans to move its 450-employee razor blade manufacturing practice out of the South Boston location, where it has been for over a century, and onto its 150-acre campus in Andover. The transition is planned to happen in the next two to three years.
The shaving manufacturer has said it plans to keep about 750 corporate, engineering and research employees in South Boston but didn't specify if they would be part of the redevelopment or relocated to a separate building, the Boston Globe reported.
Housing would make up 30% of the proposed project, with the rest being unspecified commercial development.
“It is important to us that Gillette serves as a steward for the future of the place we have called our home for more than a century,” Kara Buckley, vice president of community affairs at Gillette, said in a press release.
“This is a generational opportunity to strengthen Gillette’s business and establish a foundation for continued success as a proud South Boston-based company, while also providing significant new benefits to our neighborhood, the surrounding community, our city, and our state,” she added.
The shaving company also outlined several benefits the project would bring to the community, including creating one of the largest waterfront parks in the city and generating new jobs and real estate taxes.
Roughly 1,250 employees work at the South Boston campus today, with Gillette offering all 450 workers at the manufacturing plant new jobs at the Andover site. The company's other 750 corporate, engineering and research employees will remain at the Fort Point campus.
The shaving manufacturer has sold off underutilized properties and surface-level parking lots at the campus for years.
These sales include a 6.5-acre lot to Related Beal for $218M, a block of properties on West Second and West Third streets to Anchor Line Partners for $31.1M, and a 2.4-acre site that was once the General Electric headquarters for $83M.
Tishman Speyer filed a proposal in February for a 455K SF mixed-use development adjacent to the Gillette headquarters. Tishman bought the land from Gillette in 2021 for $80M.
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