Decades-long pizza war in Dumbo intensifies with new eatery

Publish date: 2024-05-06

Explore More

Old Fulton Street in Dumbo is about to become the Murderers’ Row of pizza.

Square-pie icon L&B Spumoni Gardens is opening a new shop on the street — right across from two already warring pizza legends, Grimaldi’s and Juliana’s, The Post has learned.

A co-owner of the 80-year-old Gravesend mainstay confirmed Sunday that Spumoni Gardens will be serving up its signature cheese-on-the-bottom, sauce-on-the-top squares across from the two coal-fired brick-oven cousins.

Permits to install pizza ovens at 46 Old Fulton St. — less than 100 feet from Grimaldi’s and about twice that from Juliana’s, which both draw hours-long lines — were filed in April, according to the city Department of Buildings.

But renovations ground to a halt there in May when the city slapped contractors with a stop-work order for improperly removing fire-halting equipment from the ceiling and for doing construction without posting the proper permits, DOB records show.

Once Spumoni Gardens opens, three of the most highly regarded pizza joints in the city will be within spitting distance of one another.

But far from igniting another food fight, the other pizzaiolos on the block insist they welcome the new competition.

“I think its gonna be a pizza mecca over there — that would be great,” said Joe Ciolli, CEO of the Grimaldi’s chain, who recently took over the Old Fulton Street location from his dad, Frank Ciolli.

Juliana’s co-owner, Matthew Grogan, practically rolled out the red carpet, too.

“There’s so many good pizza places in Dumbo and New York, so what’s one more?” he told The Post.

“More people! More food! Bring it on.”

The atmosphere in the neighborhood wasn’t always so welcoming.

Juliana’s and Grimaldi’s have been locked in a feud for years. Patsy Grimaldi sold his eponymous eatery to Ciolli in 1998 — then came out of retirement a decade later.

He opened Juliana’s, named for his mother, in the original Grimaldi’s spot when Ciolli moved down the block in 2012.

Ciolli sued to stop him but ultimately lost.

Both restaurants claimed they aren’t scared of L&B.

“It’s a different style of pizza. We have lines all the time — people come from all over the world,” Ciolli boasted.

ncG1vNJzZmimqaW8tMCNnKamZ2Jlfnp7j29maXFfobKosc2dmKuxXaW2u8bAZq6aql2eu26w1KaZqGWZo8GmutKinaKdo2LEqsDHZqWer5yueqK6zaisp5uVmXqmrdOeqbJn