Public Hearing Today on Southampton CPF Purchase of Casa Basso

The Southampton Town Board is poised to purchase Casa Basso, a longtime Westhampton restaurant also known for its 120-year-old castle and a pair of towering sculptures of musketeers, using $4 million from the Community Preservation Fund.

The 1.5-acre property at 59 Montauk Highway, the subject of a public hearing set for Tuesday, Dec. 10, also boasts 232 feet of frontage on Beaver Dam Creek. It has been on the market for nearly two years, originally asking $6.5 million, though the priced has dropped down to $4.5 million.

“We first listed this property in January of 2023 and from day one, we felt the only real buyer would be the town,” Enzo Morabito of Douglas Elliman tells Behind The Hedges.

“It just needs so much work that it doesn’t really make sense for a seasonal business. Not only that, but it adjoins property that the town has already bought along the top of the creek for preservation, so it’s an opportunity to add to that. This would also enable the town to restore and save the environment of the creek these properties back up on. The restaurant has a high occupancy and an old septic system that sits elevated on high ground above the creek and drops right down into it. You really don’t want that.”

If the purchase is approved, the restaurant building would be razed to create a waterfront park, restoring tidal marshlands at the shoreline. But the castle would be preserved.

“The intention is to add the property to what the town has collectively bought, restoring it all to contiguous wetlands with no more septic system in play,” Morabito continues. “They would also preserve the historic castle and build a park out of it where people can come down and enjoy the creek, the wildlife and the natural beauty all around. It’s really quite a sanctuary with swans and osprey and fish. There are snappers, and the striped bass come up there to spawn. People can fish and relax. The views are incredible! Overall, this sale would allow for a really positive impact to the environment and create something beautiful. We are elated that we can be part of doing something nice for the community.”

Bejto Bracovic and his wife, Zyli Bracovic, whom most know as Julie, have been the owners since 1986. They are only the third owners since the restaurant was established in 1928.

The Bracovics own not only a beloved Westhampton restaurant — which they have no plans to close while they look for a buyer — but also a piece of history, and a unique one at that.

Theophilus Brouwer, a sculptor, potter and inventor, built the castle himself in 1904 to resemble one he remembered near Seville from his travels in Spain, and named it Castle Inn.

Brouwer was known for his distinctive technique, firing iridescent pottery that was coated with transparent glaze and baked. Tiffany & Co. carried his bronze Hampton Ware and he became one of the country’s top potters. His work is considered quite valuable even today.

He relocated his factory, Brouwer Pottery, from East Hampton to Westhampton around 1902 to a small building off to the side of the castle and created a sculpture garden that includes the two ceramic cavaliers. When Angelina “Mamma” Basso and Louis Basso bought the building three decades later, according to Meredith Medina Murray who wrote a book, Around Westhampton, the kiln sat in the middle of what is now the dining room.

The Bassos, who first had a restaurant in Southampton in 1923, opened the Westhampton restaurant in 1928. It is said that during Prohibition Mamma Basso served liquor in coffee cups from bottles hidden in a tiny room in the cellar.

Valerio “Rene” Mondini bought Casa Basso in 1955, having come to work as a bartender for Mamma Basso five years earlier. An Italian immigrant, he had been working in the restaurant business since he was 13 and only had a fifth grade education. Still, he taught himself English, French and German and worked in hotels in Paris, Monte Carlo and Berlin before coming to the United States in 1940 for the World’s Fair.

As the story goes, he was arrested with other Italians while working at the Colony and was sent to a prison camp with 3,000 boys and eventually opened a restaurant for guards outside the compound in Missoula, Montana. He joined the U.S. military for citizenship after his release from prison.

After he bought Casa Basso, he added his name to the sign, calling it Rene’s Casso Basso, says Bracovic. A match book from that era calls it, “A rendezvous for lovers of good food,” and touts that the facilities could hold parties for 300 people and that it was open year-round.

When the Bracovics bought the business, they decided to just call it Casa Basso.

Bracovic was born in Montenegro, Yugoslavia and escaped the Communist country for Italy. He came to the United States in 1971, staying in New York City at first. A friend of his was working at Casa Basso and suggested he come to Westhampton for the summer, and he began in March 1972 when he was just 17. He lived in the castle, which was set up as a dormitory for the employees.

Mondini’s sister came from Italy to cook that summer, and Bracovic was the only one she could speak to in the kitchen because he spoke Italian. “When she left, she said to her brother, ‘I’m not coming back anymore, but I’m going to tell you one thing: Don’t let this kid get away.’ I came for one summer, now it’s going to be 50 years. I never left,” he says.

He eventually purchased the property with the restaurant business and the castle. Monidini held the mortgage initially.

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