Signor Sassi Mare returns to Italy with luxury pasta by the marina

Signor Sassi Mare opened in Porto Cervo on July 5, bringing the London-born brand back to Italy for the first time and giving Sardinia’s Costa Smeralda a summer-only dining room overlooking the marina. The residency sits inside You Marina Restaurant and Lounge Bar in Piazza Azzurra, a setting that makes the booking window part of the appeal: this is a one-season return, not a permanent landing.

San Carlo Group and Sunset Hospitality Group are behind the opening, and the choice of Porto Cervo gives the brand a pointed sense of homecoming. Signor Sassi began in Knightsbridge in 1984, then grew into an international name under the San Carlo umbrella, with restaurants now listed in Dubai, Riyadh, Doha and Hallandale Beach, Miami. San Carlo says the Porto Cervo address is “nestled overlooking the marina in the heart of Porto Cervo” and is meant for the summer season, which places it squarely in the resort town’s high-traffic months.

That matters in Porto Cervo, where the summer social calendar already revolves around yachts, waterfront dining and the jet-set crowd drawn to Costa Smeralda. The marina setting turns the residency into more than a branded outpost. It also gives Signor Sassi a chance to reassert its Italian roots in a place that is already coded as a stage for polished seaside dining.

Pasta still has a clear role on the table. The menu leans coastal rather than heavy, with whole fish and shellfish served alongside freshly made pasta, plus lobster linguine, black squid ink spaghetti and seafood risotto. San Carlo’s London flagship still highlights lobster spaghetti as a signature dish, which makes the Porto Cervo menu feel like an extension of the brand’s long-running seafood pasta identity rather than a generic luxury import.

The company’s own history makes the return read like a narrative loop. Signor Sassi was acquired by Carlo Distefano in 2007, after he had been a guest for more than 20 years, and the brand says its Middle East expansion began in 2008 after a guest from Kuwait asked about franchising. That path has taken the restaurant far from Knightsbridge, but Porto Cervo is the first time it has come back to Italy. For one summer, the marina is the point where the story lands.