“Things Just Come to an End Naturally”: Cafe Di Stasio St Kilda Has Closed

On the last night of service at St Kilda’s Cafe Di Stasio, regulars brought tissue boxes. “There were just so many familiar faces and people sharing their stories and sending flowers, and it was like someone had died,” says Mallory Wall. “But I think it was like an old person dying. It was a life well lived and lots of memories and happy days for the next generation.”

Wall’s husband Rinaldo Di Stasio founded the St Kilda restaurant in 1988 and the pair have run it together since the 1990s. In March, they put the restaurant on the market and they’ve now sold the business (minus the Cafe Di Stasio name) to chef and former employee Nathan Presley. “It’s a nice little continuation – a handing over.”

While the couple opened Di Stasio Citta in the CBD in 2019 and Di Stasio Pizzeria in Carlton in 2021, on Thursday July 9 they welcomed guests to the St Kilda original for the last time. “There was a big mourning party in the bar where all the women dressed up in Italian veils and pretended to be mourning Italians. It was just so hilarious,” Wall says. Among the mourners, she says, were regulars tech figure Rita Arrigo and actor Rachel Griffiths. 

The scene might have been slightly tongue-in-cheek, but it reflects the great affection many have for the business. “I still love that intergenerational thing. We had a couple of tables [on the last night] where they used to come as babies, like in their capsules underneath the tables, straight from the hospital.” Another guest, Wall says, was conceived on the premises 33 years ago. “Talk about gritty St Kilda,” she jokes. 

Guests were given cups and saucers as mementos, while Di Stasio and Wall took home the artwork. The Callum Morton sculpture from the bar will have a new home at Citta. And the metal hands on the door – casts of Di Stasio’s own hands – are currently in the couple’s home. “For so long they were part of our daily lives, they can hang out with us in Parkville for a little while.” 

The pair is at peace with the closure. “Things just come to an end naturally,” says Wall. “We lived in St Kilda for 35 years, the restaurant was just around the corner – it was our living room. We’ve moved to Parkville [and] we’re much closer to Citta and Carlton. That’s where we spend most of our time, and again, they’re like our living rooms.”

With the sale and winding down of St Kilda taking up a lot of time and mental energy, the duo is looking forward to putting more energy back into the CBD and Carlton locations. They are also working on two projects in Italy: a wine project in Piedmont and an art and food business in Naples.