On paper, the plans Jeff Hermanson and partners floated in February to redevelop a historic block of Denver’s Lower Downtown offered lots of upside for a maturing city. The longtime restaurateur and commercial real estate pro talked about adding affordable housing, something the city’s elected leaders have been pushing for downtown for years. Plans called for rooftop gardens likely to please the 54 percent of city voters who passed a green roof initiative last fall.
There was a catch. A big one. Hermanson, the CEO of Larimer Associates, was talking about redeveloping Larimer Square, a collection of buildings he owns in the 1400 block of Larimer Street in LoDo that also represent the city’s first and most storied historic district. Opposition from preservationists, city leaders and others catalyzed with speed.
A few months after unveiling them, Hermanson and his team have spiked — or at least paused — those plans, which called for two new buildings likely to dwarf their historic and legally protected 1800s predecessors. Instead of diving into the standard development process, the development team on June 18 will convene the first meeting of 50 to 60 area residents, civic leaders and experts — a group dubbed the “Larimer Square advisory committee.” The committee’s task sounds simple, even if it isn’t.
“Meeting over several months, the goal of the committee is to identify a workable plan that helps both preserve Larimer Square’s historic qualities while also evolving the Square for the next generation of Denver residents,” Hermanson and his partners with development firm Urban Villages Inc. wrote in an email to The Denver Post this week. “We are excited for this group to come together, and are committed to working with the community in an open and transparent fashion as we engage in this important discussion.”
Dana Crawford, the mother of local historic preservation, will have a seat at the table. It was Crawford who in 1965 brought together local investors to save the 19th century buildings in the 1400 block of Larimer amid a wave of downtown demolition in the name of urban renewal. Her efforts culminated in the creation of Larimer Square historic district in 1971 and the adoption of design standards for the block three years later. She sold Larimer Square in 1986. Hermanson bought it from the Hahn Company in 1993.
Since Larimer Square was protected, preservation efforts have proliferated like mad in the Mile High City. It is home to 53 historic districts today, officials say. Advocates wonder what changes to the city’s first protected block could mean elsewhere.
“I think people are worried about any precedent that would be set for historic districts,” Crawford said. “We’re all interested in the preservation of Larimer and keeping it intact.”
The new buildings proposed in February would rise from the block’s opposite alleyways: one on the Lawrence Street side and one on the Market Street side. The Lawrence Street building would house a hotel, restaurant and bar, according to Urban Villages. The Market Street building would be populated with apartments, including some for people who make 30 to 80 percent of area median income. City ordinance caps building heights on the block at 64 feet, which is roughly six stories, but early renderings of the project indicate developers may seek to go much higher.
“I’m concerned about housing for everybody, but there is a lot of places to put housing,” said Crawford. “We don’t have to put it on top of historic preservation and destroy history.”
The development team is building a case that if it doesn’t do something at Larimer Square, its historic charm may fade — as it did in the decades before Crawford and her partners arrived. Masonry, mechanical systems, electrical hardware and plumbing are all approaching a breaking point that a spit shine won’t shore up anymore, they argue. New construction isn’t just desirable, it’s a necessity.
“Larimer Square is constructed of brick and stone and wood, and as with anything else, those materials have a life cycle. At periods throughout that life cycle, it is necessary to not just clean and patch, but to make a significant, long-term investment,” the partners wrote. “No one wants to see this iconic block fall into disrepair or become a stagnant museum, so change in some form is necessary.”
Inspiration is close at hand for those championing growth and redevelopment as a companion to preservation.
The three-company team behind Denver’s Dairy Block project last week celebrated the opening of Milk Market, a 16-stall dining and retail hall on the ground floor of a six-story office building erected at 1800 Wazee St. in early 2017. That building and a connected sibling, housing the Maven Hotel, Kachina Southwestern Grill and other businesses, make up roughly 75 percent of the city block bordered by Wazee, Blake, 18th and 19th streets. Much of the remaining space is occupied by two historic structures, a three-story brick building the developers call “the firehouse building” and, at the corner of Blake and 19th, the former Windsor Dairy building built in 1918. Those two elder buildings are being gussied up now with a list of retailers, bars and restaurants ready to move in over the coming months.
“We’ve upgraded the systems — air conditioning, lighting, bathrooms. We’re doing cosmetic things like carpet and paint,” Tom Martin, vice president of commercial property management for project partner McWhinney, said this week. “It’s really making the buildings more comfortable and bringing them up to code, but at the same time it’s about keeping what’s really fun and nice and entertaining about them which is the historical nature.”
The Dairy Block has drawn praise from Crawford and City Council president Albus Brooks, who called it “a great example of how we should be handling some of the historic buildings in our city.” What that project had that Larimer Square does not is plentiful empty space. It featured surface parking lots that were redeveloped around the historic structures. The project, which reaches eight stories at its highest point, did not require a height variance from the city, officials say.
Brooks, whose council district includes LoDo, is also part of the advisory committee. He has some hard and fast rules he plans to lay out at the first meeting.
“Tearing down any historic building is dead on arrival,” Brooks said. “But what I want to tell everyone is revitalization and preservation can co-exist.”
Aside from pulling back the February plans, Hermanson and Co. aren’t saying much about their vision. They plan to approach the committee with “open minds and without preconceived solutions to the challenges our experts have identified.” They also don’t have firm timeline. The group said it is working on a website that will provide public updates on the committee discussions.
Annie Levinsky, the executive director of Historic Denver, is hopeful but also on guard with the first meeting on the horizon.
“It’s important to note that while the word is that the two-towers proposal is on hold, they could decide to restart it,” she said this week. “It’s the only plan they’ve put forward to date.”
Updated June 8, 2018, at 12:47 p.m. Because of a reporter error, this story originally misidentified the year Dana Crawford sold Larimer Square and to whom she sold it.
