It has been thirty years since Felice Bracco opened Italia Uno, a modest, family-run café on Charlotte Street.
Yet only the blue awning seems to bear signs of time. In constant movement behind his counter, the Italian continues to nourish his customers with fresh sandwiches, coffee and his wit. Seven days a week, twelve hours a day.
The choreography is well-oiled. Builders kickstart the day, followed by delivery riders, who drink coffee while they charge their e-bike batteries. At lunch, office workers meet students and staff from the adjacent universities, as well as the medical personnel from University College Hospital. Rain or shine, the queue always expands from the narrow restaurant to the pavement.
For less than a fiver, most will relish their Parma ham or chicken Milanese sandwich on the move. Not the groups of old regulars, though. Mostly present during the least busy hours, they complete the rich mosaic of customers.
“Turks in the morning, Albanians and Romanians in the evening. Italians all the time, every single day,” Felice proudly details.
Their passionate conversations muffle the Italian or British news from the three small televisions and the punctual whirring of the espresso machine. Felice takes great joy in jumping in, whilst always keeping his nose to the grindstone.
The glass counter — full of mouth-watering smoked meats, cheeses and other Italian delicacies — is also a sight to behold. On the walls, the dim light reveals an array of Italian and Neapolitan football kits and scarves, as well as framed pictures of all World Cup winning Gli Azzurri. Footballs hang from the ceiling along a garland of green-white-red flags — if anyone still held doubts.
Felice was born in South Africa but spent most of his upbringing in Bari, a port city on the Adriatic Sea in Puglia, southeastern Italy.
His move to London in his twenties was only supposed to last a few months. But in the hustle and bustle of the capital, Felice found a home that resembled him: “I kept on postponing [leaving], I wanted to be here. There was always something interesting keeping me here.”
“Then I said, well, I’ll go try [opening the café]. If I don’t, I’m never gonna have another opportunity, you know what I mean?”
The year was 1987, Felice had just opened the first iteration of Italia Uno in Soho with an associate. Nine years later, in the summer of 1996, he moved to 91 Charlotte Street on his own.
His main inspiration was Bar Italia, a revered and equally small family-owned café in Frith Street, Soho which has been running since 1949. Felice would go there every day, grab a coffee and check Italian football results.
“Nobody else but Bar Italia and us had good strong coffee, so we were successful straight away,” he recalls.
Today, after most similar places in Central London have had to close due to the unrelenting gentrification, the two Italian landmarks stay afloat.
Football was the other common denominator between the two cafés. Until a few years ago, Felice showed games in the basement. Now, he only screens matches upstairs.
“It’s not the same as before, everybody watches on their phones,” he says.
The last time he organised a watch party was in 2021, when Italy defeated England in the Euros final before an ecstatic crowd so large it could not all fit inside. A fond memory.
The beautiful game even used to show up in person. Welsh player and former Arsenal hero Aaron Ramsey, and Manchester United legend George Best — “when he was alive”, Felice likes to clarify — once counted as Italia Uno regulars.
As he recalls his youth, Felice’s energetic character shines through. It all started on a football pitch in Bari: “I was a midfielder, I ran all the way for ninety minutes, usually more than the others. At the end, they were all tired and I just kept them running.”
To this day, Felice simply never stops — even when answering my questions. When asked if he would want to slow down, he fires back: “Can I?”
“You can’t go half-speed: the music is on, you have to dance. It’s either music, dance, or you sit down and switch the radio off.”
His wife Paola also labours alongside him. “Six days a week, if I’m lucky. The unlucky week, maybe three or four.” As he explains this, she gently frowns and makes a remark in Italian, sparking hilarity amongst regulars and leaving an embarrassed smile on Felice’s face.
If retirement is not yet on the cards, this industrious man knows he will, one day, not be able to hold the pace. His two sons in their early thirties, who also frequently give a hand, will not run the business on their own. “It’s too much work. They know: they see me.”
He concludes: “When the day comes, I’ll just stop. There’s nothing I can do.”
After three years of visiting the cafe, I realise his customers like the place so much because of Felice himself. I am yet to meet a customer who will not describe their supposedly unique friendship with him.
Before leaving, I ask him about his favourite part of the job. He does not hesitate: “What I’m doing right now. Telling people my story, listening to theirs. Share ideas, you know?”
Italia Uno, 91 Charlotte Street, Fitzrovia, London W1T 4PX.
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