Like the new Comiskey Park and Michael Jackson's Bad, Renata was a throwback before it even opened its doors. When this contemporary Italian spot set up shop in the spring of 2015, the city was moving away from large, full-service restaurants and toward intimate pop-ups and cheffy pop-ins.
Renata is perhaps the biggest stand-alone dining build-out we'll see for a generation. These days, few restaurateurs have the stomach for 3,000 square feet of pink granite with 110 old-school chairs imported from Amsterdam and *lights cigar with $100 bill* its own parking lot.