So I went to Italian Village to see if it might continue to have a place in Chicago for another 92 years. They don’t make restaurants like these anymore, albeit with good reason, given rising rents, changing tastes, and the sheer manpower required to keep a multistory juggernaut operating smoothly. All around us, the dining rooms of old Chicago continue to shutter - Won Kow’s closure after 90 years last winter and Sabatino’s after nearly 50 in December, to name just two fallen icons. When people talk about the Italian Village in 2019, it’s usually as a pretheater destination, and most of the glory goes to the wine list.īut the most impressive thing about Italian Village is that it even exists. The upscale Florentine Room opened on the ground floor in 1961 and lasted 29 years before getting modernized into the glam Vivere in 1990. In 1955, the basement became La Cantina, a snug seafood restaurant made to resemble a wine cellar. Frank Sinatra once held a wedding reception in the backslappy red-sauce joint upstairs, under a Tuscan sky ceiling mural lit by hundreds of twinkling lights. Since 1927, the Capitanini family’s citadel has exerted its gravity across downtown Chicago. Hours La Cantina Dinner Tuesday to Sunday The Village Lunch and dinner daily Vivere Lunch Monday to Friday, dinner Monday to Saturday.Tab La Cantina $25 to $45 The Village $50 to $70 Vivere $60 to $80.They paused in the vestibule and beheld three staircases and three sets of menus, confused.
On a recent weeknight, I saw a hungry couple, 60-ish and gray, wander into Italian Village, perhaps lured by the massive neon sign on West Monroe Street that seems to promise something familiar and wonderful.
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