Stagioni - Four Seasons of Food — Restaurant in Charlotte

In a city full of amazing restaurants -especially Italian - one must have more than just good food and good service. The ambience and the attitude of the staff, the warmth of the experience, and the vibe of passion in the preparation is what forgives high ticket prices and keeps people coming back when there are so many choices available. I have no complaints about the food itself, the price of the meal or the servers. Our server, Taylor, was very accommodating and the food was excellent and served very professionally - we were so grateful for the dessert for my daughter's bday! Delicious! Our experience was only tarnished by the abrasive attitude of the manager and her somewhat snotty responses to our requests. I have read other reviews here and besides the portion size and price, which did not bother me at all, the only negative thing people have to say about this restaurant is about the manager. This place can do themselves a favor by paying attention to this and perhaps giving this lady more training. Ive reviewed hundreds of restaurants for magazines all over the world, visiting over 50 countries in 6 continents and even living in Europe - a good part of that time being in Italy - there was no reason that this manager should have been so patronizing as if I have never experienced a restaurant before. Last week my family was in the Maldives at some very fine places - and yesterday on my daughter's birthday - we intentionally chose this place for an elevated night. My point is we have dined in nice places and know what to expect. My party included 3 very elderly grandparents who had some needs, but this manager made it a point to tell us she already made accommodations for us. That is not true. I made res. a month ago - We had a party of 6 all along - but the reservation system would not let me put in that many people so I sent a message asking if they have room for six. The hostess called me back (very polite) and told me that would be no problem - they could've said no if it was an issue. How would I have known that when we we arrived at the restaurant all excited, that would be thrown back in our faces? They sat us in a very tight in the corner and it was uncomfortable for our elderly grandparents. We began to move the table out a little bit so they could get in and it fell apart completely. Instead of empathizing, the manager darted in and said 'this is why we don't move tables'. When I ask for a new table location she reminded me again that she had already accommodated us. Furthermore, she made it seem like she did us a favor by doing this. Really? Aren't you in the business of customer service? That should be standard! Plus, I had to remind her that WE actually accommodated her last year when the restaurant canceled our reservation on July 26th 2021 with a day's notice because they had "an issue" but then it turned out they had a private event and canceled all public reservations. We were thoroughly disappointed but understood. Please check your records - it was not due to Covid as she claimed when I brought that up. After that, we gave them another shot this year on the exact same day a year later. And when unfortunately the table situation went awry I tried to explain this, the manager continued to push back trying to explain to me how seating arrangements work. There was a table of 6 in the middle of the restaurant in the far back that we would have been fine and more comfortable for my elderly parents. It sat empty until 715, we were there at 6 PM. She could have easily switched or made me feel like she wanted to help but instead told me that no one has ever complained about a table in the corner next to the serving stand. Everyone is different and has different needs so I don't know why that's relevant. At any rate, we made it fun and like I said, food and service was great but the manager needs a lesson in good manners. Too bad for such an established place. There are so many other high-end choices in CLT with warm, friendly people with class...

I was excited to take my wife here for a date night after looking up several restaurants around Charlotte, the images of the food really sold Stagioni. We ended up sitting in the bar section right behind the hostess at a 2 top. The good, the drinks tasted great, we ordered a dirty martini and a Boulevardier. The gnocchi, focaccia, and doughnuts also was well above par and is why I rated the restaurant 3 stars.

The bad, I know the restaurant industry is hit hard right now but for me the service is in no way reflective of the price tag. Our server was doing the best she could do and was very nice but the restaurant seemed highly understaffed. Our waitress was making drinks for the entire restaurant and training someone at the same time. I asked someone else at the restaurant if we could get 2 glasses of wine after our meal and she said she would let our waitress know as she was bussing tables and taking empty plates away, I feel like this was a small ask but I watched her just walk away and she never let anyone know. I eventually got our waitress attention behind the bar to be able to get us 2 glasses of wine she was apologetic and seemed very honest with her effort which I really appreciate. (Side note this girl needs a raise she was working very hard) The other missing star is the mushroom pasta had virtually no mushrooms in it, maybe 3 stems and a quarter of 1 cap and was a bit dry. The flavor was there and maybe it was suppose to be made like this but this is how I felt as I was eating. The oysters was also very lackluster, I only tasted the chili oil on one of the oysters and the cucumbers took the actually taste of the oysters away and made the dish taste pretty boring (no salt, acid, heat). I would like to give the restaurant another chance and try a pizza and another pasta dish, but there are so many other places in CLT to try and I have had better experiences at other Italian restaurants that have a lower price tag for a more authentic experience especially from a customer...

I really wanted to love this place as I've heard so many good things about it. But our experience didn't go as well as I wanted to. We tried three different appetizers and they were all amazing. We had high expectations for the entrees, the tagliolini was good but not something you would come back for. The Linguini would've have been good if the noodles weren't undercooked, twice. I told the server about it and he took our plate away and replaced it with a new one. But the new plate has the exact same issue. My gf didn't even finish it so we just asked for the check and left. Overall the food experience is not the reason why I'm giving 3 stars instead of 4 or 5. They service was very disappointing. From the when we first got there we felt like our server didn't care too much to serve us. He did job but just at the bare minimum because he had to. The table next to us got checked on 5 times to our every 1. It was like we were being avoided for some reason. I had to ask him to help me with the menu as I didn't understand some of the words, he did but forcefully. I even told him it's our first time here and was hoping that he would explain things to us further. With a full plate of food he never even asked if we wanted a to go box and didn't even bother offering us dessert like how he did the table next to us. It was a completely different vibe when he talked to them compared to how he talked to us. It literally ruined our very rare date night. The people who brought us our food just dropped off our plates and walked away every single time. I thanked them each time as they were walking away, still not a single word from them. There was no "enjoy your meal", "how was everything so far", nothing of that sort. Even though we wanted dessert and coffee at the end, we decided to just leave to go somewhere else for it. Needless to say, we definitely won't be coming back no matter how good the bread and appetizers were. It's just not worth being treated differently than the...