Guido's, the red-sauce Italian restaurant in the circular building on Santa Monica Boulevard, is closing in the Sawtelle neighborhood, capping an end to a local icon founded 46 years ago.
An employee confirmed to L.A. TACO that the restaurant will be shuttering on May 31. According to the staffer, the restaurant's current owner does not own the lease to the property or land. Rumors abound that the building will be destroyed and the land is expected to be razed to make way for an apartment building where Guido's now stands.
Guido's is possibly more prized for its unique architecture, neon signage, towering gate, and general appearance than for what is offered on its menu these days.
Inside a squat semicircle of a red-bricked, red-roofed building hemmed in by stained glass windows, Guido's was popular for its classic warren of red booths, bar framed by hard-carved, lion-clawed wooden demigods, and shelves robust with geegaws. Here, one could live out their Goodfellas fantasies over martinis, grappa, and scampi that didn't always live up to its price point.
Over the years, Guido's has lent its old-school charm as a filming location for several TV series, including Charlie's Angels, Ratched, and the series Feud: Bette and Joan.
Framed photos on the walls depict its mustachioed founder, Guido Perry, with late-20th-century celebrities like Roy Scheider, Carol Burnett, Tom Selleck, Frank Sinatra, Bruce Jenner, Heather Locklear, Alan Alda, Oliver Stone, David Byrne, and a young Charlie Sheen.
Perry was a former team member at Dan Tana's before opening Guido's in 1979. Ten years later, a retiring Perry sold the restaurant to Antonio Castaños, a Spaniard working as maître d' at a restaurant called Dante's.
Castaños opened a Malibu location of Guido's at Point Dume Village in 1994 and later an Old Town Calabasas version in 2012 in the former location of Gaetano's, not long before he testified for the prosecution in the Rudy Kurniawan counterfeit wine scandal.
Guido's Malibu location closed in 2013, followed by the shuttering of the Calabasas restaurant in 2014.
Sawtelle's surviving Guido's, consistently cited among L.A.'s ever-ebbing list of oldest-surviving restaurants, remained a favorite throwback on Santa Monica Boulevard amid a fever of old-school businesses being erased in place of more apartments and condos. Even as the restaurant's parking lot seemed to provide a favorite idling place for a few neighborhood characters during the restaurant's off-hours.
Nonetheless, Guido's will be missed among those who treasured its vintage vibes, connection to L.A.'s history, and strong pours. And even just for those passing by who loved its big, wide arc of glowing neon.
As L.A. local writer and producer Alison Martino of Vintage Los Angeles wrote on Instagram, paying tribute to Guido and bemoaning the continued spread of character-less buildings, "This town is starting to become a coffin of my youth."
