The couple came via New York City, where they met at chef Tom Colicchio’s Craft. Crochet was the chef de cuisine there, while MacNeil was most recently running the 15-person pastry team at Del Posto in Chelsea. They relocated to Philadelphia for Crochet’s new job at Starr restaurants, and to be closer to family in New Jersey and central Pennsylvania, but soon after landing here, they decided to open their own restaurant.

The 78-seat space they found meant operating a much bigger restaurant than they had imagined, but this one came with a liquor license—in Philadelphia, a notoriously prohibitively expensive acquisition. Plus, since it had been an Italian restaurant (of the red gravy variety) in a former life, there was already a kitchen and dining room that didn’t need much work. They bought some equipment on eBay, including a sheeter for rolling out dough, and a world-class gelato machine.