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ForestParkReview.com Vol. 108, No. 32
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REVIEW
BEST SSMALL WEEKLY WEE NEWSPAPER NEWS ILLINOIS IN ILL
AUGUST 13, 2025
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Sit and Savor: Public art that you can eat on Nine painted tables are part of the Forest Park Arts Alliance’s latest installation along Madison Street Staff Reporter
See SIT AND SAVOR on page 8
Aiming for the divine at Di’Vino
A new Harlem hangout from the imaginative minds at Berwyn’s La Parra restaurant
By JESSICA MORDACQ Have you walked down Madison Street within the last week and wondered what inspired the colorful tabletop paintings of flowers, animals and abstract designs in and surrounding Constitution Court? At the end of last month, the Arts Alliance of Forest Park positioned five painted tables and 10 chairs at Constitution Court for its second public art installation. As a part of the installation, businesses could pay $350 per table and had to provide their own chairs. There are painted tables outside the Madison Street businesses Jimmy’s Place, Madison Park Kitchen, Twisted Cookie and U3 Coffee. Elements Massage has a table and chairs inside. When the Constitution Court installation is taken down at the end of September, businesses can keep their tables set up or choose to auction them off. At Constitution Court, the tables were painted by Susan Buss, Maurice Costello, Glenida Hampton, Margie Wilkinson and Zahaira McRae. McRae, a 14-year-old from Forest Park,
Jazz at the Altenheim Stoop Session
By RISÉ SANDERS-WEIR Eats Reporter
JESSICA MORDACQ/PROVIDED
From top left to bottom right, tables painted by: Zahaira McRae, Maurice Costello, Susan Buss, Margie Wilkinson, Glenida Hampton, Robin Dennis, Meghan Hunt, Anne Nacht Morgan and Susan Volk
IN Crime . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6 THIS ISSUE Opinion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Classified . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Events . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
For the past nine months the partners at Berwyn’s La Parra restaurant have plied a new menu in Forest Park. Di’Vino, 1527 S. Harlem Ave., sits along a somewhat lonely strip of Harlem. Traffic zips by the building that once housed a bar. While their original restaurant speaks Italian with a Spanish accent, Di’Vino leans further into Italian and Mediterranean fare. “More Italian with a little Asian twist,” said partner and chef Gabriel Padilla. “All our pastas are house made. Bread is made in house. Everything is made in house.” Both restaurants are family owned and run. Padilla brings his 30 plus years of helming kitchens and menus. Fellow partner and brother-in-law Valerio Muñoz has been a mixologist for more than a decade. Their dedication is apparent. An old fashioned cocktail arrived tucked inside a small wooden barrel, mysteriously filled with savory smoke. As Muñoz opened the hatch See DI’VINO on page 14
Alan Brouilette:
A Look Back: Forest Park Little League highlights Interviewed by ChatGPT from 1986 PAGE 15
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