Wednesday, March 6, 2024

Amico Nave Ristorante

This one and the other photos were taken by author, February '24.

I had to pull the details of this one from my FM 1179 page, but this one came up for a post as the restaurant announced closing with the last day being February 24, 2024. So, with that in mind, we'll take another look at it.

Amico Nave Ristorante at 203 East Villa Maria Road was built in the late 1970s as a restaurant called "Pizza Planet" (many years before Toy Story, of course) and this lasted from 1979 to 1984. Because of spotty records, it later served (briefly) as Kelly-Moore Paint Company (according to taxpayer records) and a restaurant called Buffalo Joe's as late as 1994, but has been a beauty salon from 1996 to the very early 2010s (Shapers Hair Productions, though might've gone under a different name in the late 1990s). In spring 2013, it reopened as Amico Nave from the same owners (Wade and Mary Beckman) of Shipwreck Grill across the street. In its early years Amico Nave did very well: in summer 2013, when restaurants usually have slow business, the parking lot was packed out nightly. But I suppose all things have to come to an end. Enjoy the photos and check out the post for Shipwreck Grill.
Uh-oh, hours changed! Who could have seen this coming?
While the concrete base is old, this is one of the few new light fixtures for Amico Nave.
The building is visibly older.
Currently, plans are in the works to renovate the building to look more like a ship and move Shipwreck Grill into the space.