One suitcase, sixty years

Casaline, Abruzzo

Franco Francucci was born in 1937 in a village near L'Aquila. A hard childhood, often not enough to eat, and a longing for a different life. He crossed the Alps for a leather factory in Swabia, and hated every day of it.

1962, Bahnhof Zoo

Twenty-four years old, one suitcase, no plan – and a job waiting tables on the Kurfürstendamm. He turned out to be good with people. Within months he had saved the start capital for a place of his own.

One Mark. Pizza and wine.

The first was La Grotta on Bleibtreustrasse, still in 1962. Pizza by the slice straight off the tray, red or white in a tumbler, one Mark for anything on the counter. West Berlin had never eaten like that – and stayed until the early hours.

1967: the queue was the marketing

A forty-five square metre shop on the Ku'damm. Mini pizzas off the tray, one Mark each. Nobody in Berlin had sold them before. The word travelled through the city faster than any advertising could.

1968: the name everyone knew

Then the place on Lehniner Platz, right next door to the Schaubühne. A glass counter instead of a menu, regulars who ordered by pointing, and a kitchen that was serious without ever being stiff.

Coming into Berlin along the Kurfürstendamm, it was the first Italian address you reached. So Italians who had just arrived went there first – for news, for contacts, for a room, for work. The community met at my father's tables.

The son grew up between those tables

Everyone calls him Franchino. He trained as a chef and hotel manager at the InterContinental, then worked his father's floor – carrying the plates that had made the family name.

1996: Kurfürstendamm 90

Then he opened his own, across the street. He named it after the family and nothing else. Francucci. And on the sign: Ristorante dal 1962 – his father's first year, not his own.

Where the obsession went

Bread and pasta made in house. The family olive oil on every table. And a full page of Chianina – a Tuscan breed he went looking for when it had almost disappeared. Served in slices for two, with nothing but oil and sea salt.

Since 2001 a delivery has arrived from Italy every month. The loins age three to six weeks on the bone, in plain sight in the wine cellar.

And today

For the past two years the Francucci has been in the hands of Louis, the son. Same door, same bread, same name above it – six decades after a suitcase arrived at Bahnhof Zoo.

Franco Francucci senior died in February 2024, aged 86.