A storefront on Bardstown Road that sat empty for a year and a half has found new life as Cipollini, an Italian restaurant in the heart of Louisville's Highlands neighborhood. Co-owners Dallas McGarity and Tarek Hamada opened the restaurant in the former LouVino space, betting that the neighborhood was hungry for a more focused, experience-driven take on Italian food.
Cipollini officially opened on March 27, at 1606 Bardstown Road, reoccupying the retail storefront that LouVino vacated after roughly a decade in the space, according to Appetito Magazine. Five months later, the restaurant was open, according to WLKY. McGarity told the station he believes the Highlands has been underserved for the style of Italian food Cipollini is offering, framing the concept as an experience-focused dining destination rather than a typical neighborhood red-sauce joint.
According to Louisville Metro's Bardstown Road/Baxter Avenue Corridor Review Overlay materials, the district was established in 1990 to enhance the corridor's appearance and economic vitality. Louisville Metro's adopted corridor-overlay materials say construction in the area spans about 20 years from 1885-1905 and identify Bardstown Road/Baxter Avenue as the neighborhood's major thoroughfare.
Two Longtime Louisville Hospitality Names Team Up
McGarity and Hamada are not strangers to each other or to Louisville's Italian dining scene. The pair first worked together years earlier at Volare Italian Ristorante on Frankfort Avenue, where McGarity served as executive chef, per Appetito Magazine's reporting. Hamada, meanwhile, has worked at Volare and Grassa Gramma, according to GoToLouisville.com, building a hospitality résumé in Louisville.
The partnership divides responsibilities cleanly: McGarity directs the kitchen and culinary development, while Hamada manages front-of-house hospitality and service, the same Appetito Magazine report notes. McGarity, a 2024 semifinalist for Best Chef Southeast per WLKY, already owns The Fat Lamb, the New American comfort-food restaurant he opened in 2016 at 2011 Grinstead Drive in the nearby Cherokee Triangle neighborhood, according to CanvasRebel Magazine. McGarity also picked up national attention back in February 2019, when he won Food Network's Chopped during a Chicken Challenge episode, per LOUtoday's account of the win.
A Menu Built Around Local Farms and Layered Flavor
The restaurant's name translates as little onion in Italian, reflecting what Cipollini describes as its philosophy of building flavor through simple, thoughtful layers rather than complicated fusion, according to the restaurant's own site. That approach shows up on the menu, which leans on regional farms and local suppliers, including specialty mushrooms from Louisville's Frondosa Farms used in a truffle-cream pasta and a mushroom marsala demiglace, per Cipollini's menu listings.
The menu includes lobster pasta, while the overall concept is Italian cuisine with a Kentucky twist. The station's report notes the menu is meant to stand apart from other restaurants in the area rather than replicate a familiar red-sauce formula.
Dinner-Only Hours Mark a Shift From LouVino's Brunch Crowd
Cipollini operates strictly as a dinner-only establishment, open Tuesday through Saturday from 5 to 10 p.m., without walk-in bar seating, according to the restaurant's website. That marks a real departure from LouVino, which had offered walk-in-friendly service and wine by the glass before closing in September 2024, per Appetito Magazine's account of the property's history.
Statewide business churn was still positive in Kentucky in 2024: According to the U.S. Small Business Administration's Office of Advocacy, opening and expanding establishments added 197,563 jobs while closing and contracting establishments lost 146,942, for a net increase of 50,621 jobs.
Cipollini's arrival is part of a broader wave of chef-driven openings reshaping the Bardstown Road corridor this year. It follows the Italo-Cuban restaurant Prado 264, which opened nearby at 1514 Bardstown Road, as well as the recent debut of Mimi's Ethiopian Restaurant on the same strip, both signs of significant commercial turnover as new upscale concepts move into spaces once held by legacy tenants.
