The University of Colorado’s Urban and Regional Planning students got a rare tour inside Glass House during. This photo was taken from the 23rd floor Penthouse looking west towards the mountain and out to the park.

Glass House has been moving along at a record pace and the new tenants will be starting to move in January 2007. The pool is filled with water, doors are locked as the general contractor releases them to the developer, and the certificate of occupancy is due in December.

As soon as we have the active energy of those new homeowners the Central Platte Valley will be going full force. If you think about it, this one building will almost double the density of this area. What great news for a more walkable community supporting more restaurants, shops and services. I can hardly wait, and once the building is glowing what a great night shot to post on this blog.

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Seniors to get riverfront digs
Cosmopolitan Club to have amenities of five-star hotel

By John Rebchook, Rocky Mountain News
November 24, 2006
Louisville-based Balfour Senior Living plans to build a $110 million building for active seniors in downtown Denver’s Riverfront Park, in the Central Platte Valley.

Construction of the luxury 264- suite, seven-story, age-restricted Cosmopolitan Club building next to the historic Moffat Train Depot at 15th and Little Raven streets is scheduled to start in February.

Monthly rents in the club, one of the few age-restricted developments in the country in a downtown, are expected to range from about $3,500 to $8,000 a month. The club also will charge a one-time entry fee of $10,000.

“The Cosmopolitan Club will have all of the amenities of a five-star hotel,” said Michael Schonbrun, CEO and founder of the 10- year-old Balfour.

“In today’s day and age, people over 60 are very active and want to be part of the buzz and energy of the city,” said Schonbrun, a lawyer by training, who was president of National Jewish Hospital from 1981 to 1991 and worked for former Gov. Dick Lamm after coming to Colorado in 1974.

The Cosmopolitan Club will be a welcome addition to Denver, said Tami Door, president and CEO of the Downtown Denver Partnership.

“We want to ensure that we have a great diversity of people living downtown,” she said. “That is very important for the vibrancy of downtown.”

Door said she suspects that many people living there will want to participate in downtown as mentors and volunteers.

Charlie Woolley, head of the St. Charles Town Co., has put his planned 37-story senior high-rise at 14th and Stout streets on hold, saying he has too many projects on his plate.

But he said there’s room for both the Cosmopolitan Club and his development, which he hopes to resurrect next year.

“Our site is very different from their site, but I like their location very much, too,” Woolley said. “They’re going to do great. These urban locations for seniors are more appealing, as far as activities and lifestyles, than ones in the suburbs.”

Harry Frampton, CEO of East West Partners, the developer of Riverfront Park, is a small investor in Balfour and may invest in the Cosmopolitan Club.

Frampton first pitched the site to Schonbrun when they bought the property from Trillium Corp. in the 1990s.

“I think this is really pretty cool,” Frampton said. “Balfour has been successful financially, but even more important, it builds communities that are just wonderful places for people to go to when they age.”

The land was initially sold to Archstone-Smith, the Arapahoe County-based apartment real estate investment trust, but the -REIT decided to sell most of its Denver portfolio to concentrate on other parts of the country.

Schonbrun will renovate the depot and use it as the “great room” for the development.

The long-vacant 100-year-old building was partly destroyed by a fire in 1995.

Balfour may also open the 1,200-square-foot depot for an occasional public forum or event, although the retirement community also will have a separate building for that function, Schonbrun said.

When completed in 2008, the 369,000-square-foot Cosmopolitan Club building will include 214 independent-living rental apartments, ranging in size from 600 square feet to 1,900 square feet; a European- style piazza with a garden; and four dining areas, including a bistro/pub and a gourmet-style restaurant. It also will sport a a rooftop garden, a library, a billiard room, a movie theater, a performance hall, a business center, a card room, a hair and beauty salon, and an arts and crafts room.

The amenities don’t stop there - a high-end spa is also planned.

There will be around-the-clock concierge service and 130 underground parking spaces, although Schonbrun said he suspects that most residents will find they don’t need a car. They will have private town cars to ferry them to Cherry Creek, sporting events, shopping, golf and other events.

The club will be designed by a New York firm, Robert A.M. Stern Architects. Stern is dean of the Yale School of Architecture.

His firm has designed a luxury condo at 15 Central Park West, next to the Time-Warner building, in New York; a new Ritz-Carlton hotel/condominium project in Dallas; and Aspen Highlands Village. Stern, working in Denver for the first time, will be joined by Denver- based klipp Architecture.

The interior designer, Carleton Varney, CEO of New York City- based Dorothy Draper Inc., is perhaps even better-known than Stern, at least in New York City.

Varney, known for his use of color and contrasts, has been the interior designer for such properties as the Breakers Hotel in Palm Beach, New York’s Waldorf Towers and Plaza and the Grand Hotel of Mackinac Island, in Michigan.

He even has his own brand of coffee.

“We went to the theater with him in New York, and you can’t walk two feet in New York without somebody stopping him,” Schonbrun said. “He told me he is at a stage in his life where he only works on projects that he thinks will be fun and special.”

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If you have ever been interested in Riverfront Park, then Saturday November 18th will be the best chance to go into all the buildings. From 11:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. there will be an open house for all resales in all the buildings. So you will get a chance to go into everything completed, as I understand there are about 30 resales.

Buildings on the tour include Park Place, Riverfront Tower, Promenade, Creekside I and II, The Delgany, The Townhomes, and The Brownstones.

Start in the main sales center at 1610 Little Raven and get your map from there. Here is a map to the location.

If you want to get an idea of what is on the market that you can go into here is a list of whats available in the area.

Ssbscribe to this blog to stay updated on other exciting new events downtown and in the central platte valley.

BTW, many people are hitting this blog that are not familiar with the Central Platte Valley so if you have any comments on this area let them fly for this blog entry.

Happy loft hunting!

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Trammell Crow announces new project
© Trammell Crow Co.

Artist’s rendering of the 335,00-square-foot 1900 Sixteenth Street building. It will include about 1,200 parking spaces, as well as 10,000 square feet of ground floor retail.

November 8, 2006
Trammell Crow Co. on Wednesday unveiled details of a $100 million, 18-story office building near the Millennium Bridge in the Lower Downtown, Central Platte Valley area.
The 335,00-square-foot 1900 Sixteenth Street building is being developed on behalf of its owner, Multi-Employer Property Trust, said Bill Mosher, area director of for Trammell Crow Co.’s Development and Investment Group.

The building will include about 1,200 parking spaces, as well as 10,000 square feet of ground floor retail.

Parking currently provided on the site to the adjacent Gates Plaza building will be included in the project. The master plan for the 3.3-acre block at 16th and Delgany streets includes a 250,000-square-foot office tower, for a total of 585,000 square feet on the property. The property is across from the Denver Union Station, where a $1 billion redevelopment is planned; the world headquarters for Gates Corp., and the future Museum of Contempary Art.

This is one of three major office projects in the area, which will have a total cost of more than $300 million , bringing almost a million square feet of new office space to the area.

The other two developments are by Opus Northwest and Hines.

Mosher said that there is room for all three.

“I think the occupancy rate is high and the vacancy rate is low,” said Mosher, who is separately working on one of the two teams that is competing for the Denver Union Station redevelopment.

“There is no question there is the demand for a more first-class office space in that area,” Mosher said. “I think what is distinctive about 1900 Sixteenth Street is that it will be a 250-foot high building. It will be more of an office tower than some of the other buildings. You can’t really do too many 250-foot towers in the historic Lower Downtown district. It’s also right across from Denver Union Station, where there will be a new light rail line and new bus facility It will be well-positioned to benefit from the development proposed at Union Station.”

Building construction will begin in mid-2007 with completion in late 2008. Office rates will be in the mid $20 per square foot. Trammell Crow brokers David Hart and Chris Phenicie will lease the building.

David Tryba of David Owen Tryba Architects is designing this Class AA office project, which will be certified by the United States Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design.

The building will be designed with exceptionally efficient floors and will incorporate building systems that will ensure energy efficiency in heating, cooling and lighting systems. Mosher said.

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