John-Paul Gagliano is the owner-operator of a new Libro restaurant, which is slated to open in January in the new Memphis Art Museum on Front Street and Union Avenue.
His restaurant, which will be operated independently from the museum, will have its own entrance. There also will be a designated parking garage for the restaurant and the museum. It will be just down the street from his restaurant, Tonica, which opened last October at 265 South Front Street.
Gagliano also is an owner of the Libro at Laurelwood in Novel bookstore in East Memphis, as well as Ecco and another Tonica, both Midtown restaurants.
So, how does this man do all this, you ask?
“I don’t chase it,” he says.”It chases me, somehow.”
And, he adds, “You activate the energy you put out. Something’s screaming, ‘Let’s open more places.’”
Libro in East Memphis will remain open. “That’s a monster right now. It’s gone crazy. I mean, it’s our busiest location.”
The downtown Libro will offer “the same menu for the most part.” They’ll serve lunch, as well as an upscale dinner. The menu will include “some current dishes we already have. And we’ll bring a bit more different things. I’ve come to learn East Memphis and downtown are two different crowds. Midtown, as well.”
But they’ll serve their same house-made bread, pastas, and desserts. And, Gagliano adds, “Keep everything as fresh and local as we can.”
According to the news release, the new Libro will include “a full-service catering kitchen for weddings, private events, and more.”
Also, according to the news release, the new restaurant, designed by Dryden Studio in Nashville, will be a “double height-dining room … complete with a 20-seat bar and seating both indoors and out.”
The post states Gagliano’s mother, Sabine Bachmann, opened her first restaurant just blocks away on Front Street more than two decades ago, and Gagliano grew up bussing tables and learning the business from the floor up.”
