Adam Siegel says his new restaurant, Il Ponte, will serve “a good amount of red sauce.”
The chef and co-owner of Lupi & Iris is launching the new restaurant next year with his wife and co-owner Daria Aitken-Siegel. It will be in Northwestern Mutual’s North Building, which is in the midst of a $500 million renovation (818 E. Mason St.). With construction on the building currently on schedule, Siegel and Aitken-Siegel are tentatively aiming to open Il Ponte in September 2026.
That red sauce is crucial to Il Ponte’s concept: “New York-style Italian.” “It’s not just red sauce and spaghetti and meatballs or anything like that,” says Siegel, who won a James Beard Award in 2008 while a chef at The Bartolotta Restaurants’ Lake Park Bistro. “There [will be] quite a few dishes that many people in Milwaukee have never seen. … We’re excited for that. We’re going to have fun developing the menu.”
The new spot is aiming for a more “casual fine dining” approach than Lupi & Iris, which has earned multiple prestigious recognitions since its opening three years ago, including placement as a 2023 semifinalist for the James Beard Best New Restaurant. Siegel is still developing the menu but notes that there will be pasta made largely in-house along with a sandwich selection for lunch.
The name Il Ponte means The Bridge in Italian, a play on Northwestern Mutual’s skywalk.
“Food brings people together, brings family together, colleagues, community, your friends – it’s the bridge,” says Aitken-Siegel.
The space, which is being designed by Eppstein Uhen Architects, will include a large central bar that the owners hope will be “bustling,” encouraging people to stop in and out on the go, along with a main dining room, private dining space and raised patio. In total, the space will seat 155 people. The owners are also planning to build an acoustic ceiling, similar to the one at Lupi & Iris, that minimizes noise.
“Il Ponte will be more casual food, more approachable food, but with all the finer points of service and community that we built [at Lupi & Iris],” says Aitken-Siegel. “It’s like the ‘Cheers’ song – you want to go where everybody knows your name.”
