New Life For Old Theater: Silent Movie House Could Become Event Space, Music Venue

Developer Ken Wolf is breathing new life into an old theater in Denver’s Berkeley neighborhood.

Wolf purchased the building at the northeast corner of West 44th Avenue and Yates Street and already has renovated and leased most of it. But the remaining space is an old silent movie theater that has seen better days. Though the walls may be crumbling, there is enough left of the old theater to see the potential, and Wolf wants to bring it back to its original glory.

“I just buy buildings that I like,” Wolf said. “I’m a bit of a preservationist, and I just think it would be totally cool to put this in the condition it was when it was a theater.”

Wolf is working with Jerri Theil, a promoter who learned the business from iconic Colorado promoter Barry Fey and once ran the Bluebird and Ogden theaters. Theil said Wolf asked her to meet him at the property without telling her what he wanted to do.

“When I walked in here, I was blown away,” Theil said. “It’s crazy to think that this still exists. Denver will never find something like this again.”

Before any work on the property starts, Wolf and Theil must first get a liquor license — without one, Theil said, there is no point in restoring the theater as event space and a music venue. A hearing is expected to be scheduled in January. The property also needs a zoning variance that would allow it to expand its capacity from 100 people to between 350 and 450 people.

“One hundred people would look ridiculous in here,” she said.

Neighbors in the surrounding area have expressed concern that a live-music venue might not be a good fit for the neighborhood, which is largely residential, but Wolf and Theil say that the building also will be used as a theater and event space.

“It’s not going to have 47 bars,” Wolf said. “I’m not interested in putting on events here where people will leave and throw up on our neighbors’ lawns.”

The Yates Theater isn’t the only project for which Wolf has enlisted Theil’s help. A few years ago, Wolf bought 500K SF of warehouse space that includes showroom space, a photo studio and architectural offices. 

“I could have leased it to marijuana growers all day long,” he said.

Instead, he turned it into an event space that Theil is running — Major Studios — which can be booked for private parties, corporate gatherings and, of course, live music.

Wolf bought his first piece of real estate in 1991 at 2601 Blake St. in RiNo to house the Topographic Chocolate Co., a business he owned and operated at the time. His appetite for acquiring real estate only increased and soon he owned real estate in the Highland neighborhood and several buildings in RiNo before it was known as such. He developed Denver Central Market and renovated the old warehouses that now house Il Posto, Park Burger and Sushi-Rama. Wolf sold that block, between 26th and 27th and Walnut and Larimer, earlier this year to Edens for $50.6M.

Wolf said he enjoys restoring aging buildings to the condition they were in when they were first built. 

“I’ve taken these old buildings and made them old again,” he said.