A beloved Italian restaurant has returned in a modernized 10,000-square-foot space with two separate dining experiences, one with cloth table coverings and the other a lounge with more casual dining.
The opening of Carbone’s Ristorante on Hartford’s Front Street represents the return of a storied nearly 90-year-old business that like so many others was forced to close during the pandemic.
The re-opening represents a fourth generation being shepherded in by the third generation, faith in the future of Hartford, and as fourth-generation owner Nicole Carbone said, should help in getting more people downtown.
“It’s an ambitious undertaking and something I’m glad to part of,” she said. “I think the restaurant will play an important role in getting people to come downtown.”
Nicole Carbone is the daughter of owner Vinnie Carbone, whose grandfather, grandmother and other relatives opened the restaurant in 1938 by the former Bulkeley Stadium in the city’s south end. Vinnie’s father, Gaetano was second generation.
The landmark Carbone’s Restaurant will relocate from Hartford’s South End to downtown’s Front Street after more than eight decades. (Kenneth R. Gosselin/Hartford Courant)
The reimagined, legendary restaurant has served scores of famous people through the decades, including Mick Jagger, Dustin Hoffman, Billy Joel, Christie Brinkley, Yanni, star sports figures, including professional football players Lawrence Taylor, Billy Sims. It was also a well known gathering place for political movers and shakers and for the deals that were made there.
Carbone’s was also that special restaurant where families celebrated birthdays and other milestones to make lifelong memories, a spokeswoman said.
Carbone’s will open to the public Friday at 3:30 p.m. after a soft opening and ribbon-cutting for invited guests earlier in the week.
Hartford Mayor Arunan Arulampalam, who will attend a ribbon-cutting Tuesday, said, “I look forward to enjoying many delicious meals at Carbone’s.”
Arulampalam said he’s “thrilled that Carbone’s is returning to Hartford after a six year absence.”
“We want Hartford to be the easiest place to do business in Connecticut — and with this ribbon cutting, the culinary landscape throughout Hartford continues to grow and thrive,” the mayor said.
The beloved Carbon’s Restaurant. (Courtesy)
Vinnie Carbone and family also own Carbone’s Prime, in Rocky Hill and Carbone’s Kitchen in Bloomfield.
Vinnie Carbone said there are many positive indicators for the future of Hartford.
“We believe in Hartford,” he said, giving special shoutouts to his wife for her patience, to managing partners, Mary Beth Coroccia and Paul Rafallo, his chef partners, Matt Ambrose and Sandro Zarcone, and his beverage director, Colby Phillips.
There will be some threads of history in the new Italian-American restaurant, but “there’s a lot of new space with more of a modern design,” he said. The restaurant seats 250-275 people in various rooms.
He notes three “beautiful” Murano chandeliers that were made in Italy.
Vinnie Carbone said what he loves about the business is meeting interesting people and the camaraderie of running a restaurant.
“When everybody’s doing what they’re supposed to be doing it’s like hitting that nice golf shot,” he said.
The beloved Carbon’s Restaurant. (Courtesy)
The story of Carbone’s actually starts with baseball, a spokeswoman said.
Here’s how the spokeswoman describes the start: “In 1938, brothers Charlie and Tony Carbone were operating an Atlantic gas station in Hartford’s South End next to Bulkeley Stadium. They watched the crowds coming and going from the ballpark and saw an opportunity: people needed somewhere to eat and gather.”
They took an unfinished apartment foundation adjacent to the gas station and turned it into a restaurant.
The food in those early days wasn’t elaborate — spaghetti and meatballs, grinders and fried chicken — but the location put the Carbone brothers in the middle of one of Hartford’s gathering places.
And that connection to baseball became part of Carbone’s lore.
Over the years, the restaurant welcomed some of the biggest names in baseball.
It became one of those rare restaurants where the history of a city played out around the tables.
Mark Mirko | Courant file photo
Photos of celebrity diners at Carbone’s Hartford restaurant, including Dustin Hoffman, have been framed on the restaurant’s walls. (File photo)
By the 1970s, Carbone’s was known for Hartford’s corporate “power dinners.” Executives and business leaders gathered there. Politicians came through. Athletes and entertainers came through too.
Deals were discussed over dinner.
The spokeswoman continued: “Ask people who grew up with Carbone’s about it and they don’t necessarily begin with the food.
They tell you who they were with.
They remember the room. They remember getting dressed up. They remember a parent or grandparent taking them there. They remember celebrating something important.
“In that sense, Carbone’s became a keeper of other people’s memories as much as its own.”
Vinnie Carbone has said the pandemic immediately took a toll on Carbone’s, forcing a swift shutdown.
“The pandemic changed the way — the face — of how business was done,” Carbone has said. “Now, we’re trying to pick things up and start again — from now, the new world. We’ve always felt like we’re part of this city and always had that longing to continue in the city.”
Carbone’s Restaurant (Courtesy)
