The façade-i-fication of Leona’s on Augusta
Leona’s was a warm, bustling clutch of family-owned restaurants, popularized in the 1980s for cheap Italian food and lots of it, and later known for not-as-cheap, not-as-good Italian food and lots of it. The business imploded a few years ago, leaving in its wake its eccentric white terra cotta Augusta Boulevard location, with a nineteenth-century Victorian two-flat, at least 120 years old, at its center. Until its Leona’s incarnation in 1985, the non-landmarked location had housed Dairy. Before that, Pure Farm Products stood on the site, billed in the 1920s as “Chicago’s only Ukrainian Dairy.” The draws at the dairy included Sunday jazz champagne brunches, dancing and a continental menu. When the demolition was announced, the Our Urban Times website reported that Leona’s was “the only example of the local dairy left in the City of Chicago. People would surround at least three sides of a two-flat, then put a roof over the enclosure and it would become the local dairy.” Elaine Coorens, author of “Wicker Park: From 1673 Thru 1929 and Walking Tour Guide” said to DNAInfo when the sale was announced, “This concept of taking an existing building and building around it to make it a dairy, that was the industry in this city. It is so significant, it’s way more than just a snapshot; it’s the only example left of an entire industry,” While the front story-high terra cotta façade has been preserved, the rest of the plot is filled by a stack of sixteen condominiums “starting at $750,000,” cleverly dubbed “The Boulevard,” boasting “designer kitchens, luxury finishes and private rooftop decks.” No word on the fresh-baked loaves of bread that were brought with menus to Leona’s once devoted following. (Ray Pride)
Best of Chicago 2019
