Verde Cousins No Greenhorns

I can’t imagine anyone doubting the authenticity of Verde Restaurant and Bar — it’s as Italian as an Azzurri, Ferrari and Sophia Loren pizza. Owned by Antonio Ruggerino, Louie Kallas and Vince Squillace, the three cousins from Calabria combine their passion for food, wine and warm, bearhug Italian hospitality.Chef Ruggerino has had the Calabrian way ingrained in him since birth, but, not resting on his laurels, recently undertook a chef’s equivalent of a MBA at the Italian Institute for Advanced Culinary and Pastry Arts in Italy. Vince Squillace was the architect for the project, restoring the heritage building to its original detailing, and teaming it with a touch of contemporary design. Set over two floors of a Victorian-era Italianate building, Squillace has exposed the herringbone strutting of the beams in the dining room to create soaring ceilings, and borrows heavily throughout from the classic Italian restaurant aesthetics of dark timber, white walls and crisp linen. Opening up the building even more by removing non-structural walls, Squillace and his team discovered a masonry arch, white glass tiles that were partly restored to be used as a wall finish, and a painted butcher’s sign that remains on the eastern façade. The cocktail lounge has a collection of leather ottomans in earthy hues for family and friends to gather around and relax. For a more private experience, there is a 16-seat private dining room with a presentation area for corporate dining or special occasions.A straightforward and effective audio system consists of Bose Freespace3 bass modules and satellite tubes as well as Freespace Model32 ceiling speakers, all driven by Cloud amplifiers, zone mixers and volume controls in each zone. Verde is broken up into four zones of audio; the main restaurant, the kitchen, the first level banquette seating and hall, and the function room with a data input plate for simple connection to the projector. There are switchable inputs between the music server and an iPod arrangement.