Aurora Italiana revives Bridgeland's storied Italian restaurant space
New owners honour La Dolce Vita legacy while bringing modern Italian cuisine to the iconic red-brick building.
The red-brick building in Bridgeland that once housed La Dolce Vita—Calgary's legendary Italian restaurant—has found new life. Aurora Italiana opened upstairs where the LDV Pizza Bar sat empty for three years, and it's carrying forward the legacy while charting its own course.
Rhythm Chopra and John Dick dreamed of opening an Italian restaurant for years. When the La Dolce Vita space became available, they reached out to Franco Cosentino, the original owner and chef who still owns the building. Cosentino, touched by their respect for what he built, agreed to mentor them—a rare blessing in the restaurant world.
Aurora keeps the soul of the space: vintage espresso machines, paintings on the interior walls, and other heirlooms preserved from the LDV era. But the menu is entirely modern. Small, focused, traditional Italian structured into antipasti, primi, secondi, and dolce sections. Highlights include whipped ricotta with prosciutto and truffle honey on focaccia ($18), hand-made pappardelle with slow-cooked beef and red wine ragu ($32), and a fall-apart lamb shank braised in red wine jus ($46). There's also pasta alla ruota service Tuesday through Thursday—hot pasta tossed tableside in a Parmesan wheel for $25 per person.
It's a masterclass in respecting tradition without being imprisoned by it. Cosentino calls the new owners "very good people. They're professionals, and they listen." For a city that loved La Dolce Vita, Aurora feels less like a replacement and more like a continuation.