SUMMERVILLE — A restaurant with an esteemed Neapolitan pizza program will permanently shutter this week. Antica Napoli Pizzeria , owned by master pizza chef Ciro Damiano, will serve its last customers June 2. The Italian-born chef and his team thanked the restaurant’s customers for their steadfast support over the last five years in a social media post announcing the impending closure.
Ken Dasen (left) and Jackie Dasen (right) chat with Ciro Damiano on Aug. 14, 2019, at Antica Napoli Pizzeria, located at 4650 Ladson Road, Suite 210. “Without a doubt this has been a great learning experience,” ownership wrote.
“We made so many unforgettable memories with so many guests who became friends and friends who became family.” Damiano moved to Charleston in 2013 while working as a manufacturing engineer in the aerospace industry. Yearning for a taste of home, he started making pizzas in his free time.
In 2016, the Naples, Italy, native purchased a food truck, Damiano's Wood Fired Pizza. He opened Antica Napoli at 4650 Ladson Road three years later. Story continues below Damiano strived to serve traditional pies worthy of the Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana, an organization that grants membership to pizzerias that uphold its standards for "true Neapolitan pizza.
" There are around 1,000 certificate holders worldwide . Antica Napoli became one of them in August 2020, about a year after its opening. Less than four years later, Damiano is closing the restaurant “to focus.
