When Chuck and Angela Fazio moved from a traditional real estate agency to a cloud-based international company, they were left with a beautiful building in Chandler.
So, the couple did what anyone would do. They opened a nightclub and a lounge.
TwentyThree01 Bar & Nightclub and The Forum Lounge are hidden gems in Chandler. The Instagram-worthy club marks a full-circle moment for Chuck, who worked with nightclubs in New York.
“The atmosphere is really great,” he says. “We have two patios, the bar and a dance floor. The front part of the building is The Forum Lounge. It will have live entertainment, great food and amazing ambience. It has a large event space that will also have entertainment and is available for private events.
“We want this to be a hub where people in the Valley know they can get entertainment — whatever it is.”
The music varies from Top 40 and EDM to Latin at TwentyThree01 Bar & Nightclub.
Ladies Night is every Friday in December and January, while Saturdays see the kitchen open until midnight and hookah available all night. Soon we’ll even have cigars.
On Ladies Night, women can enjoy drinks for $5 until midnight, while everyone can take advantage of happy hour starting at 4 p.m.
The menu is elevated bar food, with Korean fried chicken, popcorn shrimp, tuna tataki, chicken pot stickers, pork and vegetable rolls, barbecue pork sliders and chicken yakatori. TwentyThree01 Bar & Nightclub also boasts spicy French fries, spicy tuna roll, California roll, Philly roll, bang bang shrimp roll and crunchy hidden spicy tuna roll.
The drinks are creative and range from a pecan old fashioned to banana espresso martini to tequila colada.
The Fazios say TwentyThree01 Bar & Nightclub and The Forum Lounge were born out of necessity, not a dream. Chuck moved here in 1998 and met Angela through real estate. He says they were both broke and almost exited the real estate business.
“By the grace of God, we went on to be one of the top agents in the country and the top teams in 2005,” he says.
“The next logical step was opening a brokerage. We slowly built and built and built. Then I had a vision of building the coolest real estate office. So, we started to look for spaces. I had a vision in my head.”
For the real estate office, Chuck obtained a class six liquor license and LGE, a commercial custom builder, put its touch on the building. The bar, café and kitchen were all part of the real estate office. A game room was also featured.
“We built it to be the No. 1 single-office, independent real estate brokerage in the world,” he says proudly.
“Out of this one location, we had 906 agents, and we did about $2 billion in production and sales. We are really well known in the industry, so we were approached by a cloud-based, forward-thinking company that’s international.”
eXp wanted Chuck and Angela to work there, but, at first, neither wanted to give up the office. They prayed, looked at the options and closed the brokerage.
“The industry laughed at us because they thought we lost our minds,” he says. “It took me 16 years to go to 906 agents, and it took us three years to go to 8,000 agents worldwide. So, I have agents in India, Italy, Portugal, Canada, Mexico, France, Spain and, obviously, the United States.”
“The reason why we built up such a big brokerage is we believe in the community,” he says.
“We were into entertainment and that’s the reason why everybody loved us. We like to give back, so why not do something like this?”
TwentyThree01 Bar & Nightclub
2301 S. Stearman Drive, Chandler
480-722-9800
4 p.m. to 2 a.m. Fridays
8 p.m. to 2 a.m. Saturdays
Opens the last week in January
4 p.m. to 10 p.m. Tuesdays-Thursdays
4 p.m. to 12 a.m. Fridays and Saturdays