Sage owners debut fine-dining Italian steakhouse Il Lusso in downtown Tallahassee

Il Lusso is a fine-dining restaurant a year and a half in the making.

Its mid-century modern design is a marriage of walnut wood tables, oak floors, dramatic billowing fabric suspended from the ceiling and cotton-soft lighting in glass globes. Mosaic marble accents the bar, backsplash and throughout the interior. 

Encased by glossy charcoal subway tile, a picture window allows patrons to peer into the kitchen and witness the hustle of making Italian gourmet meals. 

The owners of Sage Restaurant in northeast Tallahassee are behind downtown's latest culinary offering. The reservation-only restaurant opens to the public Thursday.

Head Chef Terry White, whose business partner is Craig Richardson, said the 201 E. Park Avenue restaurant doesn't repeat Sage's French-inspired menu. At Il Lusso (pronounced ill-looso), dishes are inspired by authentic hand-made food and techniques developed in Northern Italy, White said.

“I want people to think they haven’t had a dining experience we hope to achieve here in town," White said. The only thing his two restaurants share in common, he added, is creating "delicious and thoughtful food."

Patrons can expect a formal service experience with several staffers waiting a table per night. 

The restaurant will serve 30-ounce, bone-in wagyu beef tomahawk ribeyes, along with premium prime Angus meats. General Manager Danny Renninger said steaks are served a la carte and range from an estimated $26 to $130. 

He said at Il Lusso the prime, dry-aged steaks are tenderized to a velvet-texture perfection. The kitchen features a Salamander 1,200-degree broiler, which sears meat without burning the inside. 

The 60-employee restaurant will debut a dinner menu, and plans are underway to introduce an affordable lunch menu early next year. The average lunch meal will be $15. 

"We are building out slow so that we know we can offer quality to the community," Renninger said. 

The menu also includes veal, duck, lamb, chicken and seafood, including pan seared scallops with pumpkin risotto and black garlic and truffle pecorino.

Its Italian fare includes a selection of pasta creations, such as blue crab ravioli with butternut squash, shaved carrots and anise sauce. Another likely palate pleaser will be the milk braised pork shoulder agnolotti, a stuffed pasta made with bone marrow, fennel and whey reduction. 

The wine selection boasts Italian and domestic offerings. 

While there's been much anticipation leading up to the doors opening, the restaurant's cancellation policy turned off some potential customers. 

Tallahassee Table, a blog featuring restaurant reviews that are published in the Tallahassee Democrat, reported a $100 per guest fee would be issued for cancellations made within less than 48 hours of a reservation. 

The social media post sparked 50 comments, mostly condemning the practice, which prompted the restaurant to scrap the policy. 

"We changed it due to public outcry," said Renninger, adding the money would have gone to Second Harvest of the Big Bend.  

Il Lusso anchors a high-profile downtown corner in the newly constructed headquarters of top Florida lobbyist Brian Ballard.

After several enticing inquiries, Ballard flirted with bringing a national chain steakhouse into his building. But he preferred to go with local restaurateurs with a solid reputation. Once he met with White and Richardson, Ballard said he believed their concept would be an opportunity to bring something unmatched in downtown Tallahassee. 

“What I wanted to do was bring in our building a first-rate, high-end restaurant similar to things you’d see in Atlanta or San Francisco or New York downtown,” said Ballard, who serves as the restaurant's landlord. “Even though people say our downtown can’t handle that, I disagree with that as a resident of this community for 25 years. It is well overdue for us to have that kind of restaurant downtown."

Il Lusso opens amid a surge of downtown development that is expected to finish as early as 2020. 

The 19-story Washington Square mixed-use project occupies an entire 1-acre city block on the northeast corner of Calhoun Street behind the Leon County Courthouse. It includes the Loews Hotel, which signals an increasing interest from national corporations in the capital city. 

The $150-million Cascades Project, a redevelopment of the Firestone and Bloxham Annex buildings, features an AC Hotel by Marriott. The project brings new apartments, townhouses, a restaurant and commercial and office space.  

Richardson said he and his partner wanted to be on the front end of the "new downtown."

"We want people to be able to come in here and feel pampered and get meals that they would have to go to bigger cities to get,” Richardson said. "This restaurant will be something for everybody. Tallahassee deserves a restaurant like this."

Contact TaMaryn Waters at tlwaters@tallahassee.com or follow @TaMarynWaters on Twitter.