Gianpaolo Paterlini grew up in the world of fine dining, but his father -Giancarlo Paterlini, co-owner of Acquerello in San Francisco – never pushed him toward the restaurant industry. “He was just my dad,” Gianpaolo says. “There was no pressure to follow in his footsteps.”
At 14, Paterlini began bussing tables at Acquerello on weekends while attending Marin Academy in San Rafael. By 16, he’d taken a job at In-N-Out Burger, where he worked off and on for nearly seven years, though he continued to spend his summers helping out at Acquerello, where he quietly absorbed the rhythms of service and hospitality.
After high school, he enrolled at Boston University without a fixed career plan. It wasn’t long before he was working for restaurateur Ming Tsai at Blue Ginger in nearby Wellesley, learning both front- and back-of-house operations. During one summer break, he went to work for Shelley Lindgren at San Francisco’s A16 and then returned to Boston University, inspired to enroll in its hospitality program.
In 2007, Paterlini joined the team at chef Michael Mina’s eponymous restaurant, also in San Francisco, for what amounted to a long, unpaid internship, working five nights a week. “It was priceless,” he recalls. “Tony Cha and Noah Dranow ran the wine program under the direction of Rajat Parr, and the intensity was amazing. Those were different times; it felt like magic.” All the while, he was working side by side with his father as a server captain at Acquerello, which at the time had an excellent wine list but no intentionally curated cellar.
Drawing on what he’d experienced at Michael Mina, Gianpaolo began intro-ducing a more strategic approach to the wine program, adding depth to the cellar with vertical vintages while focusing on the guest experience. In a bold move, he proposed dedicating himself solely to wine service. Given the restaurant’s small team of three servers, it seemed risky, but after a few short months, the experiment proved a success: Revenue stayed steady, and guests responded enthusiastically. “Having someone focused on wine paid for itself,” he says. In 2012, Acquerello earned Wine Spectator’s coveted Grand Award for its 2,400-label list-making Gianpaolo, who was 26 at the time, one of the youngest wine directors to receive the honor.
Gianpaolo Paterlini’s journey from prodigy to teacher
Mentorship has emerged as another defining aspect of his leadership. “I’ve never hired a sommelier with experience,” he says. “I train everyone from the ground up.” His proteges have gone on to achieve notable success; take longtime colleague Raphael Santos, now winery ambassador at Promontory in Napa. “I like blank slates,” Paterlini says. “Investing in people has always paid off.”
ln September, Gianpaolo flew to London to accept The World of Fine Wine’s 2025 award for Best Regional Wine List Outside the Region (Italy) on behalf of Acquerello. Upon receiving it, he recalled that when the restaurant opened in 1989, his father and chef Suzette Gresham were gifted a case of First Growth Bordeaux to anchor their wine List. Giancarlo promptly traded it for a “whole bunch” of Italian wine, and Italy remains the heart of the restaurant’s list to this day.
Now approaching 40, Gianpaolo has evolved from prodigy to teacher, a role he accepts with humility. “I retired my ego a long time ago,” he says. “At the end of the day, it’s not about what I like, it’s about helping guests find joy in the glass.”
Acquerello is a two Michelin Star restaurant located at 1722 Sacramento St, San Francisco, California, 94109. Hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 5:30 Pm to 9:30/45 PM. The restaurant is closed on Sunday and Monday.