Born in Queens, NY, Joe Campanale, the kid with the Italian name, grew up with a Jewish mother. He attended NYU and studied abroad, where he found his love for Italian wine during a semester in Florence. Joe came back home with the wine bug and jumped right into retail and hospitality. He worked various jobs including Italian Wine Merchants and Babbo, before opening some of downtown NYC’s best Italian restaurants including dell’anima, L’Artusi, and Anfora.