The Fig House: A Place to Party, Wine and Dine

If you’ve driven past Luther Burbank Middle School lately you might have noticed a somewhat fancy building with a bluish exterior directly across the school, looking curiously out of place for this stretch of Figueroa. Located next to a decidedly low-end “unisex” beauty salon, the building has no sign except for the street number—6443—affixed in gold letters to the wall.

Unless you’re a business associate or relative of this building’s owner—a man named Steve Fortunato, who looks vaguely like Nicolas Cage—chances are you have little or no idea what lies beyond this building’s blue façade.

The attached photos by Eagle Rock photographer Herb West should dispel the mystery. This is the Fig House, a recent, one-of-a-kind business that is poised to double as an art gallery and party space. Its furniture, handpicked from flea markets and vintage stores, is custom re-upholstered to match the surroundings. The tables have been handcrafted and built specifically for the space.

In a word, everything about the Fig House is meticulous, not to mention beautiful. There are three elaborate pieces of stained glass by The Judson Studios, the famous Garvanza-based family-run company that, for more than a century, according to its website, has “designed, created and installed hand-crafted stained, leaded and other unique forms of architectural glass built from the inspiration and dreams of our clients.”

The owner of the Fig House has a background in the hospitality business. A one-time server and bartender with the Patina Group, Fortunato launched the Fig House last month to fill what he refers to as “a huge gap between the fine dining restaurant experience and the catered format.”

And that’s where roomforty comes in. Officially spelled all in lower case—with "forty" as short for Fortunato—roomforty is a catering business, with a full kitchen, that Fortunato owns on the same property as the Fig House, albeit with its own address (6441 Fig).

“People go to these great restaurants where the food is phenomenal and the service is phenomenal, but on their wedding day or holiday party or 50th birthday they’ve come to expect mediocrity because it’s a catered event,” says Fortunato, adding: “The impetus—or mission—of roomforty is to narrow that gap.”

Fortunato bought the contiguous properties on 6441 and 6433 Figueroa St. for $725,000. He closed escrow in April 2013 and spent the next seven months upgrading and renovating the space at a cost, he says, of more than $1 million.

“I’m aware of the community of entrepreneurs that’s come into Highland Park before us—the guys behind York and Sonny’s Hideaway, the Shop Glass guys, the guys from Ba, Steve Jones of Better Shelter—and we’re super honored to be part of a really exciting network of entrepreneurs in Highland Park,” he says, explaining why he has invested a couple of million in the neighborhood and what he hopes to get out of it.

“There are some great people who have already done so much here, and we feel indebted to them and excited to be part of the community.”