New TAG restaurant coming to Denver tower

Brookfield Office Properties Inc. finalized negotiations to bring a signature restaurant to one of Denver’s tallest skyscrapers, 1801 California St., the company announced Monday.

TAG Restaurant Group, owned by chef Troy Guard, will open an American restaurant in 8,687 square feet of ground-level space in early 2014.
It will be the fourth Denver restaurant opened by Guard, who also owns the original TAG in Larimer Square,
TAG Raw and TAG Burger Bar.
Plans call for the largest street-level outdoor patio downtown, according to Brookfield officials, a 2-story glass wall facing 18th Street, an outdoor fireplace and lounge and “a wrap-around, open kitchen.”

The restaurant has not been named.

“Brookfield is thrilled that Chef Guard and his investors have chosen 1801 California for the newest addition to TAG Restaurant Group’s family of renowned restaurants,” said David Sternberg, senior vice president for Brookfield’s Midwest and Mountain Regions. “Chef Guard’s high-quality cuisine is a fitting addition to the other upgrades coming on line here with our $50-million renovation.”

Brookfield (NYSE: BPO), a subsidiary of Toronto-based Brookfield Asset Management Inc., paid $215 million for the 54-story former Qwest headquarters in December 2011. It took over the master lease from CenturyLink Inc. (NYSE: CTL) almost a year ago and has been renovating the 1.3 million square foot building.

It also recently announced Ink Coffee would be a ground-level retailer.

The new restaurant will “artfully showcase meat, poultry, and game through skillful culinary interpretations that offer house-crafted charcuterie and hand-made cheeses, an ultra-fresh raw bar, an in-kitchen rotisserie and wood fired grill,” according to Brookfield.

“With the exploding culinary scene here, there’s no place better than Denver to be a chef right now,” Guard said. “I’m really looking forward to expanding the restaurant scene downtown with our progressive American grill concept at 1801 California.”

Kelly Greene, president of Urban Legend, a division of Legend Retail Group, represented TAG while Brookfield was represented in-house by Peter Pavlakis and by Caroline Crowther of Legend.

Legend Retail Group
5150 E. Yale Circle, Suite 400 • Denver, CO 80222
720.529.2999 • www.ul-co.com

KING SOOPERS PULLS OUT OF CU HOSPITAL REDEVELOPMENT AT 9th & COLORADO

By Steve Raabeand Anthony Cotton The Denver Post The Denver Post

 

King Soopers is no longer part of the big redevelopment at Ninth Avenue and Colorado Boulevard in Denver.

King Soopers president Russ Dispense said he likes the location of the old University of Colorado Hospital but can't make a grocery store work under the current redevelopment plan from Fuqua Development.

The grocer was expected to be an anchor tenant for the mixed-use development on the 28-acre site of the former hospital.

"We continue to be interested in this site," Dispense said. "But due to the constraints of the current site plan, we didn't feel like we could create a functional store that would meet our customers' expectations and be reflective of this unique Denver neighborhood."

One of the grocer's problems with the site plan was that it proposed to locate the store's parking lot across the street from the store itself, potentially causing conflicts between shoppers and motorists.

The news comes as a blow to neighbors who fought against a proposed Walmart and had been ecstatic with the King Soopers announcement.

Walmart pulled out of the project last year after a campaign by neighborhood activists who were concerned about the impact of having the giant retailer in the area. The development plan proposes a mix of retail, restaurants and housing for the site that has been vacant since the hospital moved to the Fitzsimons Campus in Aurora in 2007.

City officials said in November that Fuqua Development was negotiating with King Soopers to take Walmart's place. It's too soon to tell whether King Soopers' departure will delay or even derail the redevelopment, city and neighborhood officials said.

"There's a certain level of anxiety that exists until the project moves forward," said Laurie Bogue, president of the Bellevue-Hale Neighborhood Association.

But Bogue said she and others are convinced that Atlanta-based Fuqua and its equity partner, Lionstone Group of Houston, are motivated to proceed and will make the development work despite King Soopers' pullout.

Denver City Councilwoman Jeanne Robb said the council is unlikely to approve a proposal for $21 million in
city-sponsored tax-increment financing without more detail on exactly how the project will be built out.

Robb said she would like to see more housing than has been proposed by Fuqua.

A representative for Fuqua did not respond to requests for comment.

"The economics just didn't make sense," University of Colorado president Bruce Benson said of the plan for the King Soopers store.

He said issues included the exposure that King Soopers wanted; a problem with how Albion Street runs through the property; and street-versus-underground parking.

"It's something you're not in control of. You're talking the city, the City Council, neighborhood groups — it's not an easy deal," Benson said. "We're going to get there — it just takes a long time."

Developer plans $160M mixed-used project near Anschutz Medical Campus

 

A development company announced plans Wednesday for a $160 million mixed-use project near Aurora's

Anschutz Medical Campus on East Colfax Avenue.

The complex, dubbed Block 21 and proposed by Waveland Ventures LLC, would include a six-story hotel and conference center as well as a four-story, 100-unit apartment complex; stores; restaurants; and an “urban park.”

Waveland — with offices in the Denver Tech Center; Austin, Texas; and Milwaukee — says the name is a tribute to the old Army Hospital 21 that stood at the nearby Fitzsimons Army Medical Center.

The site is on East Colfax between Potomac and Xanadu streets.
“This project will be extremely catalytic for future development on Colfax Avenue,” Rick Hayes, CEO of Waveland Ventures, said in a statement.

Block 21 will be developed through a partnership with Jackson Street Holdings LLC and Arrival Partners LLC, Waveland said.

It hopes to begin construction by late this year.

Plans call for a 200-room hotel with 30,000 square feet of meeting space and a 500-space covered parking structure. Developers said they expect to announce a franchise deal with a hotel chain next month.

The proposed project is near the site where Corporex Colorado LLC — a unit of Corporex Cos. Inc. of Covington, Ky. — is developing the 32-acre Fitzsimons Village. A 153-room SpringHill Suites by Marriott hotel opened there in 2011, and Fitzsimons Village also features an office complex used by Children’s Hospital Colorado.

Corporex has filed plans with the city of Aurora for another hotel at Colfax and Xanadu.

Aurora Mayor Steve Hogan, noting that the city is in negotiations with Corporex on those plans, declined comment on either proposal late Wednesday.

“I will say it is encouraging to see two companies interested in this part of the city,” Hogan said. “ It is a strong indicator of the changes occurring in Aurora, and is evidence of the urbanization of our community.”

Waveland, funded in 2002, specializes in venture capital and community development finance. It says it manages $800 million in assets.

Its community development arm has received $312 million in credits under the federal New Markets Tax Credit Program since 2007. The program aims to promote spur redevelopment in economically distressed communities.

Mark Harden directs print and digital news content for the Denver Business Journal and writes for the "Broadway & 17th" blog. Email: mharden@bizjournals.com. Phone: 303-803-9227.

Construction starts on Denver Trader Joe's

Workers this week broke ground on the Trader Joe's store at East Eighth Avenue and Colorado Boulevard, six months after the grocery chain confirmed its plans to open its first Denver store.

Heavy equipment has been preparing the site, and a spokeswoman for the Monrovia, Calif.-based specialty grocer confirmed Thursday that construction is underway.

“Currently, the tentative Denver store opening is fourth quarter 2013,” Alison Mochizuki said via email.

Plans call for a new 18,000-square-foot building with a separate liquor store. Under Colorado law, it will be the only store in the company’s chain allowed to have a liquor license.

Jimmy Balafas, principal of Kentro Group, a Denver development company specializing in retail that is building the store, declined comment.

Trader Joe’s is also opening a store in Boulder, at 1906 28th St. on the west end of the Twenty Ninth Street mall. Construction on that store has not begun, Mochizuki said.

A company statement said the Denver store “will feature a festive décor that mixes traditional Trader Joe’s elements such as cedar covered walls and Hawaiian motifs, combined with a local flair that includes art celebrating the neighborhood.”

Trader Joe’s is known for stocking its own brands of trendy and affordable foods such as Thai lime-chili cashews, sea salt brownies and Belgium butter waffle cookies.

It’s also known for the inexpensive Charles Shaw brand wine — or Two- or Three-Buck Chuck, as loyalists call it.

Dennis Huspeni covers real estate and retail for the Denver Business Journal and writes for the "Real Deals" blog. Phone: 303-803-9232.