Historic Denver Applies To Designate El Chapultepec Building, Protecting It From Demolition
The owners of the former home of Denver’s El Chapultepec jazz club want to demolish the 19th-century building at one of the city’s busiest intersections, spurring action from Historic Denver to preserve the property.
Historic Denver, along with former Denver City Council member Elbra Wedgeworth and local musician Ron Bland, on Tuesday filed an application to preserve the building at 1962 Market St., The Denver Post reported.
“The buildings that tell the story of our city aren’t necessarily the glamorous gems that stand out,” Historic Denver President and CEO John Deffenbaugh told the Post. “Sometimes they’re subtle, [discreet] and sit in the background. What sets this apart is the incredible music that took place inside over a very long period of time and the national reputation it earned.”
El Chapultepec, affectionately known as “the ‘Pec,” was a downtown Denver icon at 20th and Market streets for nearly 90 years before the pandemic contributed to it closing its doors in 2020 in a blow to many music fans and longtime Denverites.
Monfort Cos. purchased the property two years later, along with the adjacent Giggling Grizzly, for $5.4M. Executive Vice President Kenneth Monfort told the Denver Business Journal the company initially intended to preserve the property but has determined that is no longer possible.
“We came to know that the building was in a condemnable form,” Monfort told the DBJ.
Alterations made to the building by a former tenant, Valentes Corleons, whose legal name is Hussam Kayali, contributed to the property’s condition, the DBJ reported. Corleons undertook nonpermitted work on the building, including removing load-bearing walls and many of the club’s artifacts, according to Monfort.
“The product of all of that created a building that is no longer stable and has significantly degraded since then,” Monfort said.
Monfort’s company has redeveloped two other properties on the 1900 block of Market Street, opening Riot House nightclub and Dierks Bentley’s Whiskey Row restaurant in recent years. The block is just down the street from Coors Field, which houses the Colorado Rockies, the Major League Baseball team co-owned by Monfort’s father and uncle.
Monfort told both the Post and the DBJ that his team had met with Historic Denver and was “surprised” to learn of the application to designate the property as a landmark.
This dynamic sets up the latest in a series of face-offs between property owners and the city’s historic preservation rules, which allow any three Denver residents who meet specific criteria to apply to have a property designated, regardless of the owner’s wishes.
These cases usually occur with homes in the city’s older neighborhoods where certain styles of architecture or the prominence of former residents drive community members or Historic Denver to seek designation.
Commercial properties do sometimes find themselves caught up in these disputes. Tom’s Diner, a longtime Denver staple, drew national attention in 2019 when its owner, Tom Messina, sought to sell his namesake restaurant. The preservation effort was ultimately withdrawn, allowing demolition to continue.
The Denver City Council amended the landmark designation rules, allowing property owners more leeway to make their case during an owner-opposed designation discussion.
The landmark designation ordinance was established in 1967 after a development spate toppled many treasured buildings, but instances of property owners and preservationists at odds have become more common as the city has grown in the last 15 years.
