After closing in 2022, the historic Villa restaurant — long a backdrop for prom dates, anniversaries and birthday dinners — sat empty for three years, slowly deteriorating as real estate developers eyed the site.
The sprawling building, with its vaulted ceilings and sweeping views of Annadel State Park, seemed destined for demolition. Then a trio of Mill Valley restaurateurs saw promise in the 64-year-old complex, even in its advanced state of disrepair.
After a year of planning and another of painstaking reconstruction, The Junction is slated to open in May as a family-friendly gathering place for craft beer, upscale pizza and cocktails, along with the same sweeping views that made the hilltop a favorite for generations of Sonoma County diners.
“Everyone who comes by has a story to tell us. People remember this place,” said Liz Fiedler, who, with her husband, Dez, and business partner Jimmy Simpson, is preparing for the restaurant’s opening.
Looking to the future
The Fiedlers, who lost their home in Santa Rosa during the 2017 North Bay wildfires, opened the original Junction in Mill Valley in 2020, taking over a similarly distressed property at the edge of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area.
“It was a partial junkyard,” Liz Fiedler said of the 5,000-square-foot site, which had been filled with old cars and debris from a former auto repair shop. After clearing the property and building an expansive outdoor patio, The Junction (which was once an actual train depot) quickly became a pandemic-era oasis at the intersection of nearby hiking and biking trails. A 3,000-square-foot indoor taproom has since made it a favorite Mill Valley meet-up spot.
That — and the pizza.
In Mill Valley, the Fiedlers partnered with Jimmy Simpson of San Francisco’s PizzaHacker to create a menu of crisp, blistered pies with names like The Ohio (pepperoni, pepperoncini, mozzarella and provolone) and Yo Vinnie! (housemade sausage, pickled peppers, marinated onions, mozzarella and Grana Padano). The Santa Rosa location will feature a similar lineup, along with several new salads, wings and fried chicken.
Though the site is currently a busy construction zone, the restaurant is still recognizable. Pine siding now covers the exterior walls, and the former floor-to-ceiling windows have been replaced with glass walls that expand the view and allow outdoor access. A new 4,000-square-foot beer garden will include a play area, live music stage and plenty of room for dogs, kids and groups.
A cavernous dining room that seats 150 connects to an open bar area and game room with shuffleboard, pool tables and vintage Skee-Ball — no screens, said Fiedler, just old-fashioned games. A robust beer program with 30 taps and a bottle shop will accompany the food menu, and unlike the Mill Valley location, Santa Rosa will also have a full bar.
Lost and found
The Villa property came onto the Fiedlers’ radar almost by accident.
The couple had been looking for a second location when they happened to drive past the distinct retro-geometric Villa sign one day. Curious, they walked up the hill to take a closer look. The unusual setting and panoramic views were an easy sell. They contacted the owners, who were hoping to sell to another restaurateur, and ultimately bought the 3.5-acre property, edging out real estate developers.
“We love Mill Valley and we love Santa Rosa,” Fiedler said. “We want this to be a really family-friendly place where everyone can come and hang out.”
And the sign will stay.
A taste of history
Long before it became The Junction, the hilltop restaurant had already lived several lives.
Originally opened in 1962 as The Hilltopper, the restaurant was a mid-century destination for continental dining, a catchall term at the time for European-inspired cuisine. Dishes like lobster thermidor, abalone steaks and sole meunière were served for under $4.
Gaspare Bernardo took over the restaurant in 1976 and ran it as an Italian restaurant for nearly 50 years before retiring in 2022. The Villa became his life’s work.
Decades before farm-to-table menus and Wine Country cuisine took hold, white-tablecloth Italian dining was something of an anomaly in rural Sonoma County. Throughout its run, The Villa stuck to Italian-American staples like spaghetti and meatballs, linguine with clams, lasagna, ravioli and veal scaloppine. Tableside Caesar salad was a signature.
Whether Caesar salad will return to the new menu remains to be seen (it probably will, because who doesn’t love a Caesar). But the new owners do plan to preserve parts of the Villa’s character, including the distinctive front doors with half-moon cut-outs, the vaulted ceilings and the old sign at the bottom of the hill that welcomed generations of Santa Rosa diners.
“This space is so amazing,” Fiedler said. “You just want to sit and have a drink in the sun.”
Now the landmark property is preparing for another chapter —and a new generation of Santa Rosans climbing the oak-lined hill for dinner, drinks and the view.