Il Gatto closes in Calhoun Square
Business, Featured — By Thatcher Imboden on December 18, 2011 2:10 pmThe Star Tribune reports that Il Gatto closed up shop in Calhoun Square. In 2009, Il Gatto replaced the famed Figlio restaurant that offered lunch, dinner, and late night dining and an incredible wood-fired oven. Il Gatto was open only for dinner and late night and retained the oven, but never seemed to take off in my opinion.
Both restaurants were the brain child of Parasole, creators of Chino Latino, Cafeteria, Good Earth, Manny’s, Burger Jone’s and other Twin Cities restaurants. Parasole was quoted as saying that the economics of the restaurant were not working out with the high price of doing business at the location.
No word on what will happen to the space.
Thatcher Imboden
How cities work and change, how they are the product of their inhabitants and outside forces, and the resulting livability keep me thinking and dreaming about the future. I work in urban real estate development, am Past President of an Uptown business organization, grew up in Uptown, was on an Uptown neighborhood association Board, and am an Uptown and Lyn-Lake historian.
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10 Comments
Looking forward to not having to walk single-file on the sidewalk in front of that restaurant anymore…
Wow, Alex, what a nice way to respond to people left out of work for the holidays and another local business failed due to the economy.
It failed because it is a bad restaurant. And if you (tried to) dined there you would know. So many chances, so much evidence of a bad business model. It would be a great MBA example.
simply put, this was not a good restaurant.
Why they didn’t just remodel Figlios when it was such a popular restaurant is beyond me. I think egos got in the way of business sense. And apparently they didn’t even tell the employees and closed in the middle of the night moving furniture out? Real class.
Anybody surprised this happened? Would microsoft change its name, ditch windows and start making Linux OS? This is exactly what some genius thought they would do with dumping a successful figlios establishement for some untested ritzy experiment! I am surprised they lasted a year!
Calhoun Square is definitely is in a state of transition, more than ever before, with the opening of CB2, Timberland and the AT&T store. It will be interesting if they are able to figure out how to fill the vacant spaces left by Il Gatto and The Independent and find some long-term success for the center.
Parasole still has its name to the space, so expect another restaurant in the near future…
I was out of town and just today noticed it’s gone. Good! The place was AWFUL, ate there once and knew that from that experience it’d be closed.
Figilio was great, as they say if it’s not broken don’t fix it.
I’m surprised they made it as long as they did.