Orto, the Italian restaurant by James Beard Award-nominated chef Paul Verica, will close its doors this weekend. The NoDa concept opened off 36th Street during the pandemic, and faced labor shortages and other pandemic issues following a significantly delayed opening.

The cuisine at Orto, which translates to kitchen garden in Italian, featured Italian cuisine such as fresh pastas and raviolis, with some of the seasonal dishes Verica became known for serving at The Stanley among the small plate offerings. The restaurant’s last day of service will be Saturday, Dec. 11.

Chef/owner Paul Verica says the restaurant was facing an uphill climb as soon as it opened as a result of owing rent during the drawn-out construction phase. The restaurants progress started with delays from contractor shortages, before falling behind in a rhythm that hit nearly every pandemic obstacle. When it came time to finish the restaurant, shipping delays put the start of service even more off track.

“Light fixtures held us up eight weeks,” Verica says. “Our planter boxes for the patio, which we had to have in order to get our ABC license, held us up eight weeks. In both of those junctures, we were already paying rent.”

Once the restaurant was complete, labor was an entirely different landscape. Instead of paying cooks $15 an hour — a respectable kitchen wage pre-pandemic — Verica paying up to $5 more per hour to keep the staff he could find.

“When your labor costs go up 10 percent and your food costs go up four or five percent and you’re looking at a business that on a good day operates at 10 percent, 12 percent profitability and you do the math, it just doesn’t work,” Verica says.

Due to staffing difficulties, Verica kept the restaurant reservation book limited, fearing poor service if they packed the dining room each night. That, combined with the fact that the restaurant needed to begin paying back rent breaks given during the pandemic, led Verica and his investors to make the financial decision to close the restaurant now.

“We were at a point for probably three months where we could have been doing another two hundred covers a week, which at a $48, $52 check average adds up to a lot,” Verica says. “But we didn’t have the people to take care of them. And we didn’t have to staff to cook for them, and I wasn’t going to do bad business. In hindsight, maybe that was a bad decision on my part, but I don’t regret it. I still have The Stanley and we’re doing good there and I still have my reputation.”

The finances, however, weren’t the only driving factor. Verica says the restaurant has taken a toll on him personally, as well, as he’s been working 70-plus-hour weeks, with six or seven days at the restaurants. Continuing to work at that pace in hopes of keeping the restaurant open was a risk Verica and his investors determined not worth it, especially considering the uncertainty that remains surrounding the pandemic.

Some of the staff members of Orto will shift over to The Stanley following Orto’s last day of operation this weekend. Verica will spend time later this month traveling and taking a mental break, as well as planning his upcoming wedding.