Night Life: Mignon wine bar in downtown L.A.
With 18 seats in a 700-square-foot room anchored by a black-painted island bar, Mignon, which means “diminutive” in French, earns its name. To step off the 6th Street bustle into the wee wine bar is to enter an enclave that’s as big as some of the poured-concrete boudoirs in the lofts upstairs at the Pacific Electric Building.
One aspect that’s not petite: The rotating menu of Old World wines handpicked by sommelier and co-owner Santos Uy, who opened Mignon last month after some permitting snafus were successfully resolved. With Daniel Kronfli (also his partner in Bacaro L.A., a bastion of sophisticated but unstuffy quaffing near USC), Uy has added a spry spirit to the ever-increasing multitude of downtown options.
Uy, who speaks casually and not with the hustler intensity of many entrepreneurs on the city’s competitive nightlife scene, likes opening little wine bars for a couple of reasons. First and foremost for the businessman, who says he’s not backed by big investors, there is the practical: “They’re easier to manage and stay afloat with.” Yet, there’s another, more evocative reason: “I love the intimate feel,” Uy said, recalling a research trip he took to New York last year and its many candlelit, cuddle-up spots. “I’ve had my best experiences in small bars.”
In the surprisingly open space, with minimalist wall drawings of neckties inspired by its former life as a tailor shop and ‘50s crooner music in the air, connoisseurs can zero in on the selection. Currently on Mignon’s list of about 30 vintages, there’s a white wine from France, Domaine de la Charmoise, that’s the closest we can come to drinking a crisp linen sheet, physics be damned. For more romantic palettes, there’s Feipu Dei Massaretti, a soft red with strawberry, rose and a flirty wink of spice.
Don’t get too attached to either of these pours, though. Uy likes to keep mixing it up, but with a focus: “You won’t find new wines here, nothing from South America. It’s all within Europe, but it’s esoteric, small-batch productions,” he said. “You might find a wine here from an island off of Croatia. It’s weird stuff, but fun to sell.”
The menu also includes charcuterie, tartines, salads and cheeses — including a firm but yielding goat produced by Tomette de Chevre in France — curated, so to speak, by chef Beth Creasey-Griffiths, who Uy met when they were at Suzanne Goin’s lauded AOC.
On a street crowded with high-concept offerings — including Varnish’s ragtime cocktails and Las Perlas’ tequila and mescal concoctions — Mignon wants to break out from the class while still benefitting from the community of well-heeled drinkers. “We wanted to be a part of it,” Uy said. “We like those establishments.” The lead bartender-mastermind of Varnish, Eric Alperin, sometimes drops in to talk shop.
It remains to be seen whether Mignon can survive the downtown landscape, where the streets already flow with wine from high-end Corkbar and old standby Banquette. But as the alley mice darting around downtown know, it can pay to be small and fleet-footed.
Mignon
Where: 128 E. 6th St.
When: Daily 5 p.m. to midnight.
Price: $7 to $12 a glass; up to $100 a bottle
Contact: https://www.mignonla.com
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