Chuck Perry, an affordable housing- and preservation-minded developer who in the '90s brought a mixed-use project to the classic Downtown department store, Denver Dry Goods, has a new vision for the building.
He plans to add 55 new affordable housing units to the massive 19th-century structure that was once a must-shop, must-dine, must-be-seen-at department store that boasted everything from a tea room to a saddlery.
When the building first opened in the late 1880s, it was just three stories, Perry said, and sat on a quarter of the block. Over the years the structure grew vertically by more than six stories and stretched over half of the block, down California Street, from 15th to 16th Streets.
In 1987, during the petroleum industry bust, the department store closed as Downtown Denver emptied.
Starting in '92, Perry helped bring the building to life again, opening a mix of income-restricted housing, retail and office space.
Until the pandemic, the Denver Dry boasted a T.J. Maxx, one of the first national brands to return downtown in the '90s, and a Starbucks.
Ruth's Chris Steak House and Denver Health's Downtown Urgent Care facility are still open there.
If Perry's vision becomes reality, office space rented by Visit Denver and the Denver Urban Renewal Authority could be turned into housing, as could space T.J. Maxx once used as storage.
The building already has 51 units of affordable housing Perry helped build in the '90s, and if his plans go through, they will be remodeled. The mandate that those units remain affordable is set to expire soon, and he hopes that if he can find financing, he can preserve their affordability.
Perry's idea is in the pre-development phase, and it's far from guaranteed to work.
He's applied to the Colorado Finance and Housing Authority for low-income-housing tax credits to finance the project. Those are notoriously tough to secure. On another project, it took Perry seven rounds of applications before the financing was finally awarded, he said.
He's also submitted concept plans to the city's Department of Community Planning and Development to "get in the queue" and test the idea with various city departments.
CHFA should inform him in late November whether he received financing, Perry anticipates.
Back in the '90s, Perry was one of the Denver developers who set the course for changing how old downtown buildings function, and he's hoping to lead on that again.
After the business economy fled the city center in the '80s, Perry created affordable residential units Downtown in an attempt to lure national brands. More people living there meant better business for retailers. To thrive, Downtown needed more than nine-to-five office culture. It needed to be a neighborhood of its own.
He financed his mixed-use project at Denver Dry Goods with a mix of low-income and historic tax credit money.
The project inspired other developers reinventing swaths of downtown, bringing mixed-use projects to once industrial and office buildings.
"When we did this in the 1990s, Denver Dry Goods served as a model for 20 other historic buildings," Perry told Denverite. In the mix: the Tattered Cover's longtime Downtown home the Mercantile Building, A. T. Lewis & Sons Dry Goods Company, the Daniels and Fisher Clocktower and the Rio Grande Lofts.
With many downtown offices now sitting empty after the pandemic and storefronts vacant, urban boosters and the mayor's office have been beating the drum for another round of urban revitalization.
Perry is on the front-lines of a fix, once again working to boost the existing downtown residential population by ensuring working people have a place to live.
If his plans come to fruition, he will create housing for people making 60% of the area median income or less.
"We're hoping that adding more affordable housing, doing adaptive reuse, taking antiquated housing and retail space and a historic building and converting it to housing will help serve as a model to those other types of buildings downtown," Perry said.
Correction: An earlier version of this story misstated Chuck Perry's last name. We regret the error.
