Toppi's La Strada joins the $100 million plus Macleay Street, Potts Point shop top residential site consolidation put to market
The former La Strada premises in Potts Point have been listed for sale by Giovanna Toppi, the restaurant family matriarch.
The listing comes as her neighbours pursue an apartment project for the Macleay St strip.
The adjoining offering is four buildings combined to seek $100 million-plus for the 2170sqm holding.
Toppi’s piggybacking 322sqm corner-site offering last sold in 1979 for $348,000, with the elegant restaurant opening soon after with her late husband Walter.
La Strada took its name from the Fellini film released around the time Toppi arrived from Naples.
She came by herself with little money and no English, starting as a dishwasher but working her way up to head chef at Buona Sera, owned by Ettore Prossimo.
She went on to own and run O Sole Mio, Giovannas, La Strada and then, of course, from 1988, Machiavelli with daughters Paola and Caterina. Until it closed in 1996 the restaurant, with its distinctive black and white marble flooring designed by Frank Grill, was the place to eat for any visiting star. Her black-vested waiters, the legendary Ricky Spinelli and Franco Perez, served countless steak dianes and crepe suzettes.
All the celebrity diner photos, including Elton John, Sylvester Stallone, Sammy Davis, Rod and Rachel Stewart and Shirley Bassey, were hung in the discreet entrance. Now operating as Spitroast, Ray White Randwick agent Sam Capra has the listing in conjunction with R&W agent Jason Boon.
This article was first published in the Sunday Telegraph.