Three days after the Eaton Fire destroyed his Altadena home, Leo Bulgarini traveled through his flattened neighborhood, past burned-out homes and destroyed businesses, to check on his restaurant.
As I approached the corner of Altadena Drive and Lake Avenue, about a half-mile from my incinerated home, I quickly noticed charred rubble where the quirky Bunny Museum and Open Road Bike Shop once stood. It wasn’t more than a soccer field away from his restaurant and gelateria, Bulgarini Vino Cucina.
He expected his business to suffer the same fate.
it’s not.
His restaurant, tucked away in a shopping center courtyard, was still open.
“Why is my business one of the only ones that didn’t go up in flames?” he thought to himself. “Why was everything else burnt down?”
He felt a mixture of relief and helplessness.
When I went inside, the gelateria and restaurant were still there.
Then Bulgarini smelled smoke. He saw ash on the ground. He noticed that water from the roof (presumably from the firefighters who were trying to protect the strip mall) had pooled on the kitchen floor and some of it had spilled onto the gelato machine, possibly ruining it. I did.
There was no power. There is no running water.
That’s when it hit me.
His restaurant survived the flames of the Eaton Fire, but it may not survive the aftermath.
Leo Bulgarini stands inside Altadena’s restaurant and gelateria after the Eaton fire survived the business but nearly destroyed the neighborhood.
(Laurie Ochoa/Los Angeles Times)
It’s not just Bulgarini. Several restaurants in Altadena escaped the fire, but many customers were evacuated and will have to deal with what happens next. The cost of an uncertain future and increased costs of cleaning, rent, and other operating costs for a store that cannot open.
“It’s an open wound,” Bulgarini said of her neighborhood. “Most of the people here are gone. They don’t think about buying gelato with their families. They’re not here anymore. Their homes are gone.”
Bulgarini knows of at least 12 of the restaurant’s patrons who lost their homes in the fire. In Altadena alone, the fire destroyed more than 9,400 structures and damaged more than 1,000.
“I don’t think anyone comes here and spends two hours having dinner,” he says. “This business has been pretty much extinct for at least a year.”
Bugalini said he will likely temporarily move the restaurant to another location, perhaps Eagle Rock or Montrose. He plans to keep the Altadena location, but doesn’t see it reopening anytime soon. He said his restaurant cannot be used as a safe place to serve or eat food.
Nancy’s Greek Cafe and adjacent bakery, located across the Bulgarini courtyard, also survived the fire.
Owner Sean Shakmarian had been trying for days to get into the restaurant without success.
On Monday, he entered his cafe for the first time.
The interior of the restaurant remained intact.
Shakhmarian wore an N95 mask as he moved through the kitchen and dining room, parts of which were covered in dust and ash. The smell of smoke permeated the air.
He didn’t have the courage to open the fridge and freezer. The store had been without power for several days and he didn’t want to emit the stench of rotten food.
Sean Shakhmarian, owner of Nancy’s Greek Cafe, says he doesn’t know when he will be able to reopen his Altadena restaurant and bakery.
(Cindy Carcamo/Los Angeles Times)
Shakhmarin said he lost at least $5,000 in food alone. There was no way to recoup that loss, he said. Last year, he stopped taking business insurance because his premiums doubled. He said he couldn’t afford it.
As of Monday, his cafe still had no running water or electricity. He said authorities must first wait for both to be turned on before bringing in special crews to remove what he said could be “toxic” ash and debris. .
Before the fire, Nancy’s was already underperforming, Shahmarian said. The location of the restaurant is difficult to find, far from the street and in an unremarkable shopping center.
“It’s going to be even more difficult now that everyone’s gone,” he said.
But he said he doesn’t want to lose employees who are already looking for other jobs. At least two people, including the chef, lost their homes in the fire.
Shakhmarin said they plan to reopen within two to four months once power and water are restored, but said that could only lead to “another phase of losses.”
“It’s a big responsibility to reopen, considering the burden of salaries and rent,” he says. “But there are no customers.”
For now, Shakmarian has set up a GoFundMe to help rebuild his business.
Bulgarini spent three days cleaning the restaurant, throwing out rotten meat, fish, pasta and 2,300 pounds of homemade gelato. He calculates that he has lost $100,000 worth of food because of all the special ingredients and time it takes to make gelato and pasta from scratch.
Only his lobster sauce takes three days to make.
Among the few food items that survived were homemade nut butters for homemade frozen desserts and $1,200 chunks of Parmesan cheese.
Born and raised in Rome, Bulgarini first learned to make gelato in Sicily. He opened Altadena Gelateria in 2006, earning praise from former Times restaurant critics Jonathan Gold and Patricia Escalcega and former Times food editor Amy Scattergood. He has created a following thanks to his reputation for creating Italian desserts using the best ingredients. The nuts he uses come from Italy, including premium pistachio bronte from Sicily. He buys nuts directly from nut producers, roasts them and extracts the oil to make gelato.
Leo Bulgarini samples gelato outside a gelateria in Altadena in 2007.
(Stefano Partella/For the Times)
The 55-year-old said he has insurance on his restaurant and that it may cover some of the loss, but likely not all.
He started a GoFundMe to raise money to restart in a new location and support employees until the Altadena restaurant can safely reopen.
Bulgarini challenges outsiders who believe that because his restaurant is still standing, everything will be okay while so many others have burned down.
“Bulgarini is not okay,” he said of his restaurant. “We’re not winners in any of this. You’ve lost your home, you’ve lost your sanctuary, and now you’re really losing business because it’s not going to last for a while. There are no winners.”
Mr. Bulgarini and Mr. Shakhmarian have spent most of their days securing aid and housing for themselves and their employees. They navigate the complex paperwork required by the Federal Emergency Management Agency and insurance companies.
Bulgarini said she really hasn’t had much time to grieve the loss of her home, a Spanish bungalow built in 1923.
Leo Bulgarini at the site of his home in Altadena, which was destroyed after the Eaton fire.
(Albert Lee/Los Angeles Times)
He and his wife, Elizabeth, have been busy between finding a new location to open their restaurant and making arrangements for some sort of normalcy for their 17-year-old son, Lorenzo.
Bulgarini continues to push herself. He said he needs to work to pay the bills and stay sane.
But there are moments — usually at night — when Mr. Bulgarini can’t help but feel depressed. A feeling of helplessness sinks in and doubts take over.
“Why couldn’t I have done more?” he thinks to himself. “Why couldn’t you protect your friend’s house?”
Over the years, he realized that writing down what he was thinking helped him get out of this kind of funk.
On Tuesday night, he put pencil to paper and wrote, “I’m still alive.”
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