Ground breaks on Nona Mia space (formerly Sweet Devil Moon) for ‘Campagnolo.’
Peasant Restaurants, the group behind Peasant Bistro, has broken ground on a soon-to-open Italian eatery in Midtown, Creative Loafing first reported.
Permits filed with City of Atlanta last September suggested the Italian restaurant would open as “Bistro 980.” Instead, it will be called Campagnolo.
The Italian restaurant and bar is on schedule to open in February, according to Jeffrey Bruce Baker Designs, the architectural firm responsible for the rendering shown above.
Campagnolo will open in the now shuttered Nona Mia space (said to be cursed), at 980 Piedmont Avenue, next door to the recently opened 5 Napkin Burger (which replaced Nickiemoto’s).
As shown in the rendering, Midtowners can rejoice in knowing the hideous plastic patio enclosure formerly on the space was recently torn down and will be no more.
37 Responses
Old Big Tomato site, or was it Red Tomato?
hi s! it was big red tomato originally. here’s all of the restaurants to date (that we’re aware of) that opened there:
Big Red Tomato Bistro. Dead.
Balance Restaurant. Dead.
Fishmonger Seafood. Dead.
Sweet Devil Moon. Dead.
Nona Mia Cafe. Dead.
–cjs
Judging by this “rendering” and JBB’s website, I must ask…. they don’t teach Photoshop at Southern Poly? Wow. Pay some SCAD student $200 bucks and show something you (or other people) shouldn’t be embarrassed about….
As for the space… drove by the other day and saw some progress. Figured we would be getting news on WNA soon. Thanks for the info… being Italian, I will be very interested in seeing what kind of offerings this place will have. I am still searching for a good Italian restaurant down here….
Big Red Tomato actually had a fairly long run there; the others – not so much. Just the removal of the patio awning/enclosure is an improvement as I noticed a couple days ago when I drove by. Crossing my fingers given this will be a Peasant property, since this is actually within walking distance.
Removing the covered patio was a BIG plus. Smart move.
@ KB – Try Maggiano’s, it’s Atlanta’s take on great Italian…oh, wait…I see where the problem with that is. Nevermind.
Removing that terrible enclosure was a HUGE improvement. People eating on a patio want to feel like they’re outside, and not to sound shallow, but especially at this intersection people want to be “seen.” The Peasant group may be the saving grace for this cursed spot.
@Urbanist
Your synicism isn’t even based on fact, though i have known this for some time. Being Italian from the BRONX, as i’m sure Urbanist is not, there are many good italian restaurants in Atlanta. Il Localino in Inman Park and Nino’s on Chesire Bridge are two of my favorites, both are old school Little Italy style. Just shows that with Urbanist elitest attitude does not always mean elite taste.
Maggiano’s is a chain that has locations throughout Georgia and Florida… Try Nino’s or Alfredo’s (if you have the $$) for Atlanta’s take on Italian..
Wanna bet it doesn’t open on time?
Positive good news and DB Urbanist still finds a way to post something negative.
I will only be happy if the food here is sourced from local farms within 1.87 miles from the table, who use organic methods of farming only, pay a fair wage to their employees, and insist that said employees wear clothing made from organic, sustainable cotton. The owner must drive a hybrid car, and only drive it for trips greater than five miles from the cave in which he must live. I also insist that the owner of the restaurant not consider even consider opening a second location, or even making a profit.
Then, and only then, will I support this restaurant.
I couldn’t care less what the food is like.
@ JT – you’re right…but only because “synicism” isn’t a real word, and therefore can’t be based on fact.
To clarify, my comment was a joke. Truth be told, I’m not really a big fan of Italian food, no matter how great it may be. Of course, the usual response to that statement here in Atlanta is – “What!? You mean you don’t like Lasagna and Pizza?”. I assume everyone whose panties aren’t in a bundle, and who can read at somewhere above a 5th grade level, understood that in the first place though…
Try carbonara trattoria in dunwoody. Just opened last fall, but I’d throw them into the “best italian in atl” conversation. Servers are a little young and raw, but the food and wine are superb.
How can you not be a fan of Italian food?! And yet you go around saying how Atlantans have no taste…
wha?
We’ll see how this pans out. The downfall for most Italian efforts in the South seems to be not adhering to the main characteristics of Italian cuisine… simplicity achieved by sticking to less than eight ingredients per dish and relying on quality in lieu of flare and overdone preparation.
@ Mike – I’m not a big fan of it, simply because I find most Italian food a bit too heavy for me. I know you may think that everyone has to like what is stereotypically considered “good”, in order to have taste, but then again you also probably think that everyone who wears graphic shirts has good taste in fashion, and white linens at a restaurant mean “fancy”.
Playing to my many criticisms, you’re a prime example of how so many people in this city just do what they’e supposed to do, rather than doing something that might actually appeal to them. I guess I shouldn’t wonder why suburbs and Republicans are so popular here…
Pizza Hut and Golden Coral both hv great italian food
Urbanist… haha wow, you don’t even know me, yet you have no issue labeling me… my family background is Italian, and I understand that real Italian food is not just lasagna and pizza. Yes, I love Italian food, not because I “do what I’m suppose to do”, but because I grew up with it and I just flat out like it. I have nothing to be ashamed of.
If someone disliked food you enjoyed to cook/eat, you would have no problem telling them how they…
1. have no taste
2. they have no style because they MUST like/wear graphic t-shirts
3. do what they’re supposed to do because everyone in this city are sheep
3. probably live in the suburbs
4. probably are Republican, etc etc etc
It’s so childish and pathetic. You think you sound educated and intelligent, but you really are making a fool of yourself.
FYI there was a breakfast place in this space before the Red Tomato. It was a little “challenged” – one morning we stopped to eat there, and the owner had to send her son to the store to buy eggs to cook! LOL. Good luck with the new restaurant, hope it does well.
All need to go to La Pietra Cucina to tastE chef logues Italian in the ATL
I hope it does well, simply because I’m tired of seeing things close in Midtown. I could care less about Italian food though.
I really like this blog, rarely read the comments, but…
Have frequent posters considered collectively ignoring urbanist? He’s clearly a sad little guy with very little going for himself. You reward him by letting him get under your skin.
Is opening same time as Aselina Cucina on 12th & peachtree street!!!!!!!!!!!
@ MidtownLSM – When everyone know you’re right, regardless of how bad the truth sucks, it’s pretty hard to ignore.
@ Mike – I’d like to point out that it was you who alluded to the fact that anyone who didn’t like Italian was tasteless.
I get that people have their own culinary tastes, and I take no issue with that. I absolutely hate brussel sprouts, but I know a lot of people that love them. On the other hand, I love Oysters, and know plenty of people who won’t touch them. No love lost.
And it’s hard to deny that there is very little sense of individuality in the Atlanta area as a whole…
yeah, definitely not excited about another Italian place, but who knows, it could end up being great. I wish them the best. I think the addition of 5 Napkin Burger was a mistake for that corner. And now with Outwrite gone, I really hope this new place brings some cool character to the neighborhood.
Urbanist, this is straight from the Senor Patron thread:
“@ AJ & Kevin – Fair point…I guess it looks like the wallets of Atlanta are in the back pockets of people with little to no taste.”
Here you are stating that people in Atlanta have no taste because another “shitty” Mexican place is opening up… alluding that people who like Mexican are tasteless. And I never said people who don’t like Italian are tasteless… I’m stating that for someone who so easily calls others tasteless is stating they don’t like something (Italian)… as if it’s OK you don’t like Italian but if someone likes Italian (or Mexican) they have no taste or “has to like what everyone thinks is stereotypically good, etc”… and if anybody does not agree with you, you are quick to label them.
We all get it… you hate Atlanta… so why do you live here? I know you want the city to improve, as do I, but your negativity and childish comments are annoying. Change doesn’t happen overnight and not everything that opens in this city can be “unique” and “creative”.
There is way too much huss and fuss over a new restaurant opening. This isn’t a bad thing. It isn’t a McDonalds or Subway. It is a local business. If the food isn’t good then there will be a new restaurant that opens there. Regardless, it is not a chain so give it a chance. Everytime there is a restaurant announcement on this website, someone has to complain that either a) they don’t like the food or b) think that that genre of food has hit critical mass. If you don’t like it, don’t go, but no one has any business getting on here slamming a place that isn’t even opened yet just because they hoped to get a different genre of food. This also goes to all the morons who complain about “yet another” burger joint or “yet another” mexican restaurant or whatever. Obviously there is a demand. You can get some pretty damn amazing hamburgers in this city, so if there is another option, fantastic. If you don’t want another option, then don’t go.
To those complaining that there aren’t enough unique eats or local flare. Try moving to a city that truly sucks at the culinary arts like Charlotte, Birmingham, Nashville, or Tampa and then complain. We are not New Orleans, so no we don’t have our own very unique and specific flavor, but there are only a handful, a very small handful of places in this country that do. But what Atlanta does have are some very creative professionals like those at Wildfire, Adobe and Ecco, and we have some chefs and restaurants that can make the basics really damn good like Farm Burger and South City. There will never be another great culinary invention like Creole or true Southern cooking so stop expecting there to be some great movement or Atlanta food invention. This type of desperate pushing, rather than supporting and enjoying the great things we do have, is what leads places to create hideous things like fried butter (Iowa) and a burger between some random pastry item (South Carolina), making those people look like morons. Instead enjoy the creative twists we do have from some very good local restaurants.
@ Mike –
“alluding that people who like Mexican are tasteless”
No…alluding to the fact that, because we have a multitude of shitty Mexican joints all within a handful of blocks from each other (not to mention the rest of the city), in what is dubbed as Atlanta’s most cosmopolitan neighborhood…is an indication that if, as another reader suggested, these restaurants open up because of our preference as noted by the way we spend our money…then there are a lot of people who spend their money in a tasteless, boring, and generic kind of way.
I like Mexican…every once in a while. I don’t like it enough to find it necessary to have 97 dumpy mexican joints within 2 blocks of each other.
I’m only here because of a job. I’ll be gone soon enough. I moved here 4 years ago, willing to give Atlanta a shot, and then when I realized it was essentially the epitome of what cities shouldn’t be, I thought “well hey, since things are seemingly as bad as they can get from many perspectives, things can only get better, right?”…which I was wrong about…
I don’t think everything that opens in this city needs to be unique and creative…and there are a handful of places that are unique and creative. It’d be nice if I didn’t have to go to the same 4 or 5 places every time I wanted to go out, thereby diminishing the unique and creative at the hands of redundancy…
Come on people…your dislike of Urbanist (who I find interesting and provocative, even when he is wrong) doesn’t change the fact that on the whole Atlantans don’t have the most sophisticated taste in the country. This is the city whose main magazine has declared Waffle House to be in its Hall of Fame. There’s a reason why hamburger restaurants, mexican restaurants, and barfood joints survive like cockroaches and other places fade away. This city has a lot of very beautifully designed restaurants with below average servers (who don’t know enough about their own menus and can’t seem to visit your table once they’ve delivered your food) and forgetful, if not mediocre food.
I believe that people only criticize for two reasons, jealousy and the hope for it to be something better than it is. And I do believe that Urbanist’s criticism is rooted in the latter, so to criticize someone whose remarks are for the hope of improvement is difficult. But the criticisms displayed are poorly rooted with unreasonable expectations. Having moved here 4 years ago, I cannot see how one can reasonably expect the city to fully turn the corner to some great urban landscape, especially when 90% of that 4 years was rooted in such difficult economic times. Expecting the city to change face in 4 years is unreasonable and also displays the lack of knowledge of how cities grow and develop. It took a decade for Manhattan to be ruined, and it took two decades to repair it. It took less than a half a decade for the few neighborhoods in Charlotte that were unique to be ruined, and most have still never recovered. Cabrini Green was at its height in 10 years and it has been 15 and it still hasn’t become what it was planned to be. With that in mind, Atlanta was doing things wrong for 35+ years. So to expect that plate of spaghetti to be sorted out in less than half a decade is entirely unreasonable.
There also is a complete lack of understanding where this city was and where it has come from. We have seen the revival of neighborhoods like Virginia Highlands, Castleberry Hill, Inman Park, Little Five Points and Midtown into thriving places. Yes many of them have gaps and holes that need to be filled but that isn’t going to happen until the economy improves. Castleberry Hill has even grown to have its own local independent grocer, something most cities in this country don’t have, so Atlanta is moving in the right direction. Of course there will be some missteps. The location of Atlanta Station, improper or unsuccessful businesses, but that is part of the process, and it sure as hell beats the alternative of the new version of urban renewal that is New Urbanism. The trial and error process of things like these restaurants is what allows neighborhoods to grow organically and develop a unique character. The trial and error is what allows the appropriate business and development that is needed to become a mainstay.
There is constant reference to other cities, and Urbanist claims he wants to move. But unless he plans on going to New York, Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, or maybe Seattle the same can be expected. Denver is nothing more than Atlanta with mountains and more white people. Portland has a growing homeless problem that makes Five Points look like Buckhead. Birmingham, Indianapolis, and Tampa aren’t even attempting to do responsible urban development. Charlotte has been twice named the most sprawling city in America, while developing no unique character of its own, residing in a perpetual state of endless suburbs. Houston has no planning laws at all and would make an urban planner, developer, or activist want to vomit on themselves. Ditto to Dallas. Armed with a great mayor, a growing base of citizens who want to see the city improve, and the fastest growing young professional college educated population in this country, Atlanta is on the cusp of turning that corner (the effects the streetcar will have on blighted Auburn and empty Poplar are an excellent sign) but it will not happen in 4 years.
It doesn’t matter where Urbanist moves; he will be an unhappy troll wherever he goes.
All this over a hopefully cute little Italian joint!
Very well said BCATL
@Alexander
Thank you. I just have a tough time seeing how anyone can either call themselves an urbanist, or the rest of the people on here who try and act as if they care about the community. Beating down a local establishment before it even opens is counterproductive. If a McDonalds, Subway, or Wal-Mart was opening, I get it. But give this business a chance. For all we know maybe the food isnt the best in the world, but it may have a great atmosphere. Maybe it will be Americanized Italian food, but it doesnt mean that they may not make it great. The reaction people give for openings like this speaks volumes about how they perceive the rest of the city and it is disappointing that so many people can be self destructive when not knowing a lick about the establishment or even what it may evolve into after patrons’ responses.
Man, I think Atlanta is full of really great restaurants. I can’t think of a single kind of food I haven’t found an excellent place for. You should leave Midtown sometime! There are tons of good places OTP.
I might just be ignorant when it comes to taste but I guess that’s one of the perks of being a Southerner… I’m easy to please and too naive to understand why Yanks/Westerners hate everything so much 🙂