Build (Denver) or Die
The last ten years have been an extremely exciting time to be in Denver!
Here at VDT, we’ve been fortunate enough to have a slice of the local building opportunity in the multifamily and mixed use sectors. As a long time member of the Denver design community, we’ve witnessed the change of the city since the redevelopment of LoDo through the 90s, and are proud to have established an office in this very neighborhood in 2015. While the office continues to grow, we’re excited to work on more multifamily residential, mixed use, and office spaces in the Mile High City, exploring ways that good design can create thriving communities and ample opportunities.
With our new office in the Dairy Block, we are perfectly positioned to create such communities throughout the city. Our success on local projects with Kairoi Development has given us the connections and tools to navigate the city’s permitting and entitlement process with ease, and implement innovative construction techniques. Similarly, our success with countless tech companies across the nation have given us the tools to navigate the post pandemic office landscape and find innovative solutions to the future of work.
In the post-industrial RiNo district, we utilized a prefabricated construction system for the Edison Apartments. Speeding up the construction process, this method took careful navigation with the city’s permitting committee, allowing us to establish a strong, trusted relationship with the City of Denver when the project came to fruition as a success. Reflective of the neighborhood's past, the multifamily residential project incorporates a material language found in the surrounding structures, while offering a high end finish with luxury amenities. The building’s floor plan optimized the number of units offered and responded to the site’s views of the nearby mountains and city skyline to offer fantastic outdoor amenity spaces. Exceeding the developer’s expectations, we delivered extra profitable space and more units than expected.
Similarly, in the Uptown neighborhood we navigated a tricky zoning ordinance that was expected to reduce the number of units in the multifamily residential Park17 development. Our designers worked relentlessly, creating complex volumes that carved spaces and optimized rentable square footage.
Working locally allowed for close collaboration with structural engineers, which then allowed us to get the absolute most out of a challenging triangular site without sacrificing the program. This process, again allowed us to deliver more units to our partners at Kairoi Development, in addition to high end amenities and stellar city and mountain views. Our success with the Edison Apartments and Park 17 projects emphasizes our ability to understand client goals and exceed them through careful planning, collaboration, and iteration.
In the workplace sector, we actively design to incorporate a sense of place making. Our Colorado experience continues in other front range cities with our work on VMware’s Broomfield office. Here, we incorporated a large perforated metal screen illustrating the beloved flatirons in their lobby, in an effort to connect employees to the famous Colorado landscape and offering a sense of pride in their location.
Outside of the centennial state, we have also had immense success with Midwest and West Coast tech companies, where we have been investigating what the future of work means in a post-pandemic state. Our work with Glassdoor’s San Francisco and Chicago offices look into how a workplace can adapt to changing program requirements and offer flexibility in the use of spaces. Flex areas and open work stations also allow employees to have a sense of autonomy in their office experience, adapting physical space to meet their own needs.
These offices, like VMware Broomfield, offered a sense of place in the incorporation of environmental graphics and art installations by our Media–Objectives studio, by connecting employees to their company’s identity and that of the surrounding cities of Chicago and San Francisco. Having offices in each of these respective cities allowed us to not only take a hands-on approach in the construction phase, but also the design phase. Intertwining our own lived experiences with those of company employees gives us an advanced understanding of a city’s identity and the role it plays in employees life.
We can’t wait to dive into more opportunities that allow us to utilize our downtown location and combine our expertise in both the workplace and residential sectors! We’re here with our sleeves rolled up and ready to jump into local work that will contribute to cohesive communities and improve the lives of Denverites. With multiple multi-family developer projects on the way, we’re happy to say that we’re staying busy and eager for more Denver based projects.
