New Italian restaurant Florio’s opens Wednesday in Crystal Lake, aims to be ‘upscale and friendly’

After a year of planning and construction, locally owned Florio’s Italian restaurant is opening Wednesday off Randall Road in Crystal Lake.

Lake in the Hills resident and owner Dominic Florio stepped out of retirement at age 73 last year to pursue the new venture. The location was previously office space, so the place needed lot of work done to create a kitchen and dining area, he said. Florio last year received a $10,000 Commercial Facade Improvement Grant from Crystal Lake to help with construction expenses.

The fine-dining restaurant, located at 1540 Carlemont Drive, will have dishes inspired by southern Italy including seafood, pasta, chicken and veal. The full menu can be viewed on the restaurant’s website at floriositalian.com.

“I’ve got stuff you see in everyday restaurants and stuff that you don’t, that’s my own,” he said.

Florio will open the doors to the public for the first time at 4 p.m. Wednesday and he plans to host a grand opening the following weekend. Fridays and Saturdays will have late-night entertainment he described as “contemporary Sinatra-style music.” The kitchen will close at 10 p.m. and the bar and a limited menu will be available until closing at 1 a.m. weeknights and 2 a.m. Friday and Saturday.

Florio’s Italian is heavily inspired by the first restaurant Florio owned under the same name in Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood in the 1980s, he said. He remembers reading an article that listed his restaurant as one of the top Italian restaurants in the city.

“Their tagline was ‘upscale and friendly,’” he said. “That’s what I want. ... It suits us perfect.”

The Crystal Lake location will seat about 20 people at the bar and about 90 people at tables. There will be three separate sections called Roma, Bari and Cosenza – all places in Italy where Florio’s grandparents are from.