By Marice Richter
Photography by Thanin Viriyaki
One of Christina Cooley Pastore’s fondest childhood memories in Southlake was going to the local flea market with her mother, where she hunted for porcelain dog figurines to add to her collection.
While the flea market is long gone, Christina’s love of hunting treasures has never diminished. Only now, as an adult, she has parlayed that passion into a lucrative business importing antique furniture, artwork, lighting and decorative accessories from Italy, where she lives with her husband, Alessandro Pastore, and their four young sons.
The couple’s import business, Villa Blu, which means “Blue Home,” is a way for Christina to indulge her passion for hunting for vintage treasures and restoring the antiques and collectibles that she finds.
“She has a really good eye for precious things,” Alessandro said. “You can find some really nice things if you have a good eye.”
The couple and their children live in Rome, where they scour the city’s vintage and resale shops, sourcing items to import to Dallas, where Villa Blu is based. Their merchandise is for sale at Benny Jack Antiques, an emporium of antiques and collectible merchandise displaying the merchandise of a curated group of vendors in two different Dallas locations.
During a visit to Texas, they got the idea to start an import business from Christina’s sister-in-law, who showed her nightstands she had purchased from a vendor at an antiques show in Round Top, Texas, in 2023. What really caught their attention was that the vendor had been importing furniture from France, refinishing it and reselling it at Round Top, according to Christina.
“Knowing all the amazing things I can find in Rome, and how accessible it is when you are in Europe to find antique furniture, I figured I could do that,” she said. “Since I always loved resale and vintage, it seemed like the perfect match for me.”
It also gave her a chance to travel back to Texas more often.
Back in Rome, the couple began buying items to sell, but they needed a venue for their merchandise.
“At first, I thought about selling online,” Christina said. “But then we stumbled across a magazine article that mentioned Benny Jack’s.”
On a return trip to Texas, they visited Benny Jack Antiques to inquire about leasing space.
“It just happened that Benny Jack Antiques on Riverfront in the Dallas Design District was expanding when we were looking for a space,” Christina said. “We put down a deposit because the space wasn’t ready. In September 2023, we moved in and have been there ever since. All our merchandise is sourced in Italy.”
Although most of their products were found in Rome, the couple also travels to other parts of Italy to seek out items to revitalize and resell.
After setting up a booth at Benny Jack Antiques, they participated in the Marburger Farm Antique Show in the spring of 2024, regarded as the crown jewel of the Round Top antique shows.
“We would love to do that again but with a seven-year-old, a five-year-old and two-year-old twins, that is going to have to wait,” Christina said.
For Christina, 39, the journey from home in Texas to life in Italy began her junior year at the University of Texas, when she decided to join a study abroad program.
At first, she planned to go to Spain because she had studied Spanish for many years.
“But my dad said I would really love Italy,” she said. So she settled on a program with a few weeks in France and the rest of the time in Italy.
After the trip, she returned to Texas to finish her senior year at the University of Texas. After graduating in 2010, she took a summer job at Standard & Poor’s (now S&P Global) in Dallas. By the end of the summer, she was offered a full-time receptionist job, but she turned it down because she needed to return to Italy.
“I reached out to everyone I knew or had met when I was there for advice,” she said.
A contact put her in touch with an American girl who was living in Italy and teaching English.
“She told me it wasn’t difficult to find a job teaching English,” says Christina.
By August 2010, 22-year-old Christina was heading back to Italy. She arranged a stay with a professor she had studied with on her trip, who lived in Rome. The professor agreed to let Christina live with her for three months as long as she would teach the professor’s two daughters to speak English.
At first, Christina planned to stay in Italy for a limited time and then return to the United States.
“I thought I wanted to stay in Italy for a year but it would be about four or five months,” she said.
Her plans changed when she met Alessandro in January 2011 in Rome. A five-generation native of Rome, Alessandro, now 46, worked for the Vatican’s publishing house, a job he began after graduating from college.
It wasn’t long before he realized that he was in love with Christina and wanted to marry her. In 2014, they were married at Mission Espada in San Antonio. Since they lived in Rome, they agreed to marry in Texas, and “we got the Italians to Texas,” Christina said.
Since Alessandro is Catholic, they agreed on a Catholic wedding and Mission Espada was the first mission in Texas, established in 1690 by Spain and relocated in 1731 to what is now San Antonio.
Before establishing Villa Blu, Christina worked in various jobs, including teaching English and running an English-language school. After becoming fluent in Italian as well as English, she also worked as a translator, including translating documents for the Vatican, where Alessandro continues to work full-time.
Christina and Alessandro spend at least a month every summer with their children in Texas. Christina’s mother, Connie Cooley, who shares her passion for collectibles, often helps by bringing items from storage in Dallas to Benny Jack Antiques to keep the space full with merchandise.
Villa Blu’s success has led to a larger and more prominent space at Benny Jack Antiques.
That success has also led the couple to consider expanding into other markets in Texas, as well as California and New York. They are also contemplating adding Mid-Century Modern items to their inventory.