Italian Restaurant Gets Warm Welcome Before it Opens

Even before they served their first glass of wine or plate of pasta, owners of a new Centreville Italian restaurant got a warm reception from residents who welcomed them into the community while peppering them with culinary advice.

For a good part of last fall, San Vito Restaurant was doing considerable remodeling of its space in a shopping plaza along Stone Road near Braddock Road. For most of that time, passersby would knock on the windows to ask a few questions or just offer general encouragement, said Shannon Lawrie, the restaurant’s general manager.

“People were just really nice,” Lawrie said. “They were impressed by what we were doing on the inside and they said they were really happy we had moved in.”

In fact, it was the wholesomeness of the community that convinced the restaurant owners to take a shot at the Stone Road location. The space, a few paces from a Giant food store, had been occupied by a series of restaurants over the past few years that had failed.

However, the San Vito owners toured the area around the plaza and liked what they saw -- plenty of well manicured town homes and single family residences filled with young couples and their families, Lawrie said. More importantly, “everybody we talked to seemed so nice,” Lawrie said.

Since the grand opening in January, business has been good, although the customer base is slightly different that at the San Vito’s sister restaurant in Burke. The Centreville crowd is a bit younger, with more families and comes in a bit later, Lawrie said.

Italian restaurants are known for their casual, family ambience and San Vito is no different. The aroma of garlic and marinara sauce fills the entrance as customers make their way past a massive wooden bar into the red-tiled main dining room.

 And, the San Vito takes their commitment to the community seriously, Lawrie said. Uniformed police officers, firefighters and the military get 50 percent off their meal and the restaurant has donated gift cards to the Sully District police station for its Officer of the Quarter competition, Lawrie said.

“It’s a way for us to show our support,” said Lawrie, a criminal justice major at George Mason University whose father was a District of Columbia police officer.

 As for the suggestions they received during the pre-opening phase, Lawrie said they are trying to work as many of them into their operations as possible.

“The one thing we are trying to do is to get the outdoor seating set up,” Lawrie said. “It will give everybody a chance to enjoy the beautiful weather when it gets here.”