The Lamest Corner of Cherry Creek
The Cherry Creek area is one of Denver’s most pleasant neighborhoods for walking, especially Cherry Creek north. Although a majority of retailers consist of day spas, furriers, and organic dog food boutiques, the neighborhood itself very pedestrian and bike friendly.
I’ll probably never set foot in Antoine Du Chez day spa, but some of my favorite restaurants like the Cherry Cricket, Rodney’s, and Chez Jose’s are scattered throughout the district - Plus there’s a modern library and of course the Cherry Creek Bike Rack.
There’s even a public, (or private – who knows anymore,) square at 1st and Fillmore that shows films in the summer and hosts ice skating in the winter.
Opposite 1st Avenue around the big mall the area is still very pedestrian friendly. The rear of the mall opens up to Cherry Creek , (the actual creek,) and the adjacent multi-use path. Following their recent opening the area in front of Nordstrom’s has become quite inviting with trees and people friendly landscaping. It really is a quality semi-urbanized shopping center that’s people AND car friendly. That’s opposed to other area malls which plant trees and walkways inside of their grounds, but outside limitations still force you to drive there.
However there’s one abandoned pocket in Cherry Creek. This sad square is located just west of the mall, behind a cluster of free standing stores.
Most likely envisioned as a shared public square I’m sure drawings or models pictured families gathering for a shopping breaks, couples enjoying a picnic, or a small band piping music into the air. But it seems to have wound up as an abandoned afterthought. The problem isn’t the square itself, but that it’s BEHIND a bunch of bleak posterior store walls.
Originally there was a Tower Records here that DID have a back door which created some traffic, however after they went out of business the Container Store took over and walled it off. The other buildings, (Cost Plus, Bed Bath and Beyond, and some sort of Nordstrom’s annex building,) all turn their backs to this little square, giving it a boxy Soviet aesthetic with the white walls and emergency exits. A creepy tunnel between Cost Plus and Nordstroms doesn’t help either.
It would be nice if there were rear windows and doors to the retailers – but I can’t blame them for not creating access, as it does add cost to man staff and equipment for a completely separate entry/exit point. Plus we should be lucky these businesses are still IN business.
The two restaurants could contribute more. I realize it’s winter, but the only thing Elway’s Steakhouse adds is a plastic patio shade and generators or something laying around. Macaroni Grill isn’t much better.
So what can be done to make this square more inviting? Summer Saturdays hosts a farmers market in the Bed Bath and Beyond parking lot – so why not expand it to this corner? Or how about a swap meet or art show on weekends – (keeping it to Cherry Creek standards of course.) At least paint a mural behind on that long Container Store wall.
If nothing is done come spring I’ll be forced to set up an easel here and offer caricature drawings to the few passers bye. Very poor ones at that.
Murals might help. In SW Colorado, trompe d’oiel (sp?) murals grace blank downtown walls in towns like Delta and Durango. That would be best. But barring that kind of budget these days, a design contest for local artists or school kids might work. No additional retail staff then required.
This is the saddest result of developer stupidity I’ve seen. Everytime I see it I almost cry for what we lost in the name of improvements. Being a Denver old timer, I remember when this was THE Cherry Creek Mall, designed in a super modern fashion (which is now the rage of Mid Century Modern style.) You would park your car in the surrounding lots and most of the stores had entrance doors but the main doors faced on this lovely park area. If I haven’t lost all my marbles, I think there were lots of benches and flowers. Bed Bath and Beyond use to be a large department store with glorious huge windows facing on the park and a large entrance there that encouraged people to drift back and forth between it and the mall. On the far opposite end was a restaurant with lots of outdoor seating in summer and large windows looking over the green-space in winter. I can’t remember all the other little stores that were there but some elegant dress shops and snazzy shoe shops were favorites.
Then in the bust cycle of the late 70s and early 80s, this type of mall fell out of fashion. What stores filled the space wanted a bigger presences on the street. For a long time they couldn’t even find tenets for the back part where CostPlus and Macys are.
When the boom times finally returned to Denver, they built the monstrosity of the “new” Cherry Creek Mall and this one was left as an ugly step-sister.
When Flatirons Crossing made such a splash with the Village,its “special” outdoor mall area, I hoped someone with vision would do the same thing for this area of Cherry Creek and return it to its former beauty.
I’ve been to malls like the original Cherry Creek mall where they survived, like Phoenix and Los Angeles, and they are so much more inviting. And this was just like that not that long ago.
Thanks very much for that historical information and insight. I had no idea that this little square and the buildings surrounding it were that old. (I moved here in ’93.)
They’ve been remodeled and updated, so I figured they were tertiary stand alones constructed in more recent years.
Even with the new tenants, what’s wrong with windows? Less shelf space I guess…
Thanks again for the comment – all the best – James…
Here’s a blurb about it:
1953 Cherry Creek Shopping Center in Denver opened, planned by architect Temple Buell since 1946, under construction since 1950, anchored by Denver Dry Goods on one side of First Avenue and in 1954 by Buell’s metal-trimmed Sears Roebuck store on the other side of First Avenue.
Oh, yeah, here’s the link:
http://history.sandiego.edu/gen/soc/shoppingcenter.html
Built in 1953, it was like the third of fourth of it’s kind in the US. There should be like a plaque commemorating this.