And, hey pesto – another icon Lucio’s vanishes in big smoke

Famed Sydney Italian restaurant Lucio’s is closing after 38 years, taking its incredible art collection with it.

Lucio and Sally Galletto at their famed Sydney restaurant Lucio’s, which is closing its doors in January. Picture: John Feder

Lucio Galletto was 13 when his mum put him in a white shirt, black bow tie and long pants for the first time and told it was time for work.

“I locked myself in the toilet for half an hour; I thought it looked ridiculous,” recalls the restaurateur, “but when they finally got me out, it took me less than half an hour to know what it was I wanted to do for the rest of my life.”

Fifty-four years later, Galletto is hanging up the tie. The jovial and respected restaurateur who came to Sydney from his native Liguria in 1977 for the love of wife-to-be Sally this week announced the end of an era for Lucio’s, his famous Paddington restaurant.

The entrance to Lucio’s Paddington. Picture: John Appleyard

Tagliolini alla Granseola (green pasta with blue swimmer crab) at Lucio’s. Picture: Jenifer Jagielski

The imminent closure marks a changing of the guard among the veterans of Sydney’s top-end dining scene. Serge Dansereau announced this week he is stepping away from Balmoral’s Bathers Pavilion after 20 years, having sold out to his business partner

It follows Neil Perry’s decision earlier this year to quit the restaurant business after he announced he was stepping away from his Rockpool Dining Group.

With the closure of Lucio’s doors on January 30 will go the famed art collection that has entranced diners for 38 years, almost as much as his pesto alla Genovese and impeccable cellar.

Galletto has tasked auction house Deutscher Hackett with selling a career’s worth of memories and friendships with artists who have appreciated the Lucio’s table over the years. They include John Olsen, Charles Blackman, Tim Storrier and Ron Robertson Swan and, according to Deutscher’s Henry Mulholland, will ­realise “in excess of” $250,000 when they go to auction in March.

Lucio Galletto poses for a photograph on opening day for Lucio’s. Picture: Supplied

The genesis of the collection is Sydney restaurant folklore. “It all started back in 1984 when Sidney Nolan sketched a Ned Kelly on a table docket. I was so thrilled that I spent as much as I could on having it framed (with gold leaf) and proudly hung it on the wall.”

So moved was Nolan that he presented Lucio with a painting. And so it began. “John Olsen has been a dear, dear friend for many years. Like me, he loves people, and when he walks into the restaurant he always has a smile for us and the guests as well,” Galletto says. “We both share a great love of food and art, and I cherish his friendship.”

Paintings, ceramics and sculptures adorn the walls at Lucio’s. Picture: Craig Wilson

The collection includes paintings, ceramics and sculptures but there’s one particular painting that’s not for sale, by John Coburn, who died in 2006. It was painted by the artist while he was in hospital in 2001 for open heart surgery.

“One day an art dealer went to see him and said ‘John, we will sell this one,’ and John said ‘No, this is for Lucio.’ Obviously, I’m not gonna sell that,” Galletto says.

The man himself. Picture: Craig Wilson

Lucio’s has fed the rich and the famous, from rock stars to world leaders, for years. Memorable was the night Mikhail Gorbachev dined. “An underworld figure was at a table, waiting for his guest. Suddenly there’s police and KGB everywhere. He’s very agitated and asks me ‘What’s going on?’

“ ‘It’s OK,’ I tell him, ‘it’s just Gorbachev coming for dinner.’ ”