Carlo's Restaurant & Lounge Closes Permanently After 34 Years

CHICAGO HEIGHTS, IL — It's the end of an era in Chicago Heights as Carlo's Restaurant & Lounge - Lorenzetti's has permanently closed. The Italian restaurant owned by the Carlo Lorenzetti family had been open at 560 W. 14th Place since 1986, its Facebook page said.

The Lorenzetti family will keep open Livio's, their restaurant in St. John, Indiana, an employee at that restaurant said over the phone Wednesday. But the one in Chicago Heights has already closed for the final time. The employee did not know the final day Carlo's was open, but that it had been for carryout during the coronavirus shutdown.

"It is with a heavy heart we must bid you farewell," Carlo's posted on Facebook this week. "Thank you for your support through the years."

The Livio's employee said Carlo's was "not getting the same business" as Livio's, although plans before the coronavirus pandemic were to keep both restaurants open. Livio's has been open for 17 years, the employee there said.

Carlo's closing is also a result of the struggles the restaurant endured connected to the forced shutdown of dine-in services, the employee said.

The Lorenzetti's Restaurants website describes Carlo's as their "landmark restaurant." They point to a number of newspaper awards won over the years.

Carlo Lorenzetti, founder of the restaurants, died in 2010 according to a Chicago Tribune obituary.

Livio's in St. John remains open from 3-8 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday at 75 percent capacity at booths and tables and 50 percent capacity at the bar per the current Indiana reopening phase guidelines.

This article originally appeared on the Chicago Heights Patch