Iaci’s Casa Capri

Iaci’s Casa Capri Restaurant at 1022 Seymour Street was a Vancouver institution for more than 50 years. It closed in 1982.

Story from: Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the City’s Hidden History

Rick Iaci was driving down Seymour Street one day when he was horrified to see dozens of framed photographs being thrown into a dumpster outside #1022—the house that was a family restaurant for more than 50 years. He stopped and put as many as he could into his car, and in that moment, saved a piece of Vancouver’s history.

The Iaci’s:

Frank and Eva Iaci, cousins to the Filippone’s who ran the Penthouse across the street, raised their six children in the home, and turned it into a bootlegging joint during the Depression. Eva started making plates of pasta so her customers could have something to eat while they drank. The menu was simple—spaghetti with meatballs, T-bone steak, ravioli, chicken cacciatore. A card clipped to the menu read “Dear God. Please save us from the Italian man that expects us to cook as well as his mother. How in the hell can we when his wife can’t?”

Her food was so popular that the house became known as Casa Capri. The family called it #1022, locals just called it Iaci’s.

The Castellani’s:

Iaci’s was gone by the time I arrived in Vancouver, and I first heard about it when I was researching Murder by Milkshake. Before Rene Castellani murdered his wife, he, Esther and their daughter Jeannine, would spend a few nights a week in the restaurant, helping out in the kitchen or just hanging out.

“We were at Iaci’s all the time. I don’t even know how many times a week,” says Jeannine. “We never sat in the restaurant. We were always in the kitchen where they were cooking.” When it got late, Jeannine was put to bed in Eva’s downstairs suite which also harboured the illegal booze. “When the police came in, they never checked because they saw me there, sound asleep,” she says.

Customers could park for free in the tiny lot in the back, go through the basement, climb up the stairs to the back porch and then enter through the kitchen. Someone would be there to greet them, take their coats, and find them a seat in one of the three small front rooms, where they could check out the Iaci’s old wedding photos or framed covers of Life and Look magazines.

The washroom:

Rick remembers the bathroom being covered in stock certificates. One night a broker was using the facilities when he noticed that one of the old stocks was worth money. “They took down half the wall to get it,” says Rick. The magazine covers went up after that.

Casa Capri was the place to go for anyone looking for a good meal and a drink late at night. After performing at the Palomar or the Cave stars such as Dean Martin, Red Skelton, Tom Jones, Louis Armstrong, and Sonny and Cher would head to Iaci’s with an autographed photo made out to one of the family members—usually one of Eva’s daughters—Koko, Teenie and Toots.

Rick is now the guardian for the old photos. He spent every Saturday night for more than ten years at Casa Capri, sometimes as the bartender when the regular guy didn’t turn up. Once he asked Eva why they were using Tang in the Vodka and orange juice. She told him: “If it’s good enough for the astronauts, it’s good enough for our customers.”

In 2005, Eva and Frank Iaci were posthumously inducted into the BC Restaurant Hall of Fame.

© All rights reserved. Unless otherwise indicated, all blog content copyright Eve Lazarus.