I never personally made my way into the original Geno's, this because reliable sources told stories of dark, drab, depressing settings and equally dark, drab, depressing food.
Geno's has, of course, been taken over by the Zola-team, and the spot has appropriately been changed up and Zola-ised. It's somewhat surprising they decided to keep the "Geno's" name, but that's about the only thing that has remained the same.
The interiors can only be described as pretty damn cool. It's like a lounge mixed with an abandoned circus. We use "Lynchian" to describe many things -- too many, really -- here in Spokane, but this spot truly could have been picked straight out from Inland Empire.
As for the food, it seemed good. I say "seemed" as I had been competing in SpiceaWAR a few hours before checking the spot out -- it's how I roll -- and my taste buds might have been somewhat numb. We tried the wild mushroom pizza, and while the crust won't have Veraci running back to rethink its methods, we did quite enjoy what Geno's did with their imported New York Lamonica's dough. The toppings, too, were nice and fresh.
The caprese salad hit home well, as far as the freshness goes. Good mozzarella; good balsamic vinegar; lettuce on the side. It's hard to make a downright bad caprese salad, but even harder to make a good one, and thus I think Geno's deserves kudos for falling in the latter category. Good ingredients, not surprisingly, go a long way.
I didn't go through their beer selection, but as they had Pipeline Porter on tap -- one I enjoy quite a bit -- it seems like they have their selection down pretty well.
Geno's, then, is pretty promising. It follows the latest Spokane trend of providing casually upscale casual food at affordable prices. We'll be back, definitely.