The most recent landmark designated in the city was 4450 Tennyson St. (Courtesy City and County of Denver)
Three Denver homes were named individual city landmarks this year, and another 17 buildings near the University of Denver were made part of a new historic district.
Landmark status recognizes properties of historical, architectural, geographical and cultural importance to the city. The status also prevents a building from being demolished, except in rare circumstances.
Here’s a rundown of the three new landmark properties and historic district created this year:
Currie/Dryer Cottage – 4450 Tennyson St.
The Berkeley neighborhood in Denver has experienced rapid change over the past few decades. New apartment buildings and commercial structures dot Tennyson Street, the main artery of the area. Hip, trendy restaurants and businesses front streets with young professionals and families meandering throughout.
But in the shadow of those new buildings sits a tiny, 115-year-old one-story home. And as of December, it’s now a city landmark because of that.
The cottage at 4450 Tennyson St. was built in 1909 by carpenter Arthur Wellington Currie, who lived in a larger brick home next door and rented the cottage out. It was sold to the Dryer family around 1913, who owned it through 1992. During that time, according to a city report, it continued to serve as rental and affordable housing for immigrants and minorities, despite Denver’s warming to nativism and Ku Klux Klan activities during the early portion of the Dryer’s ownership.
The home is known as an “alley house,” of which only a handful remain standing in Berkeley. These buildings are smaller and usually sit along alleys instead of the road, and were often used to generate rental income for larger homes in front of them.
2323 E. Dakota Ave.
The house as seen between 1936 and 1937, shortly after completion. (Courtesy City and County of Denver)
Boxy and minimalistic, this 2,741-square-foot home built in 1936 was made a landmark in April.
The house was notable for its design and for one of its former occupants. Built in the “international style,” developed in the 1920s and brought to the states in the 30s, the home’s “lack of ornamentation” and “cubist conception” are defining characteristics. It was the first house in Denver built in this design, and possibly the first in Colorado too, per public records on the property. The style was most common in California and the northeast, and was particularly popular in Europe until the 1970s.
Between 1965-1985, actor, producer and public relations professional Barry Lorie lived in the home. Born in Denver in 1927, Lorie was instrumental in the making of many famous movies, such as Rocky V and Close Encounters of the Third Kind.
5086 Vrain St.
The home at 5086 Vrain St. in Denver. (BusinessDen file)
Built in 1924, the “Spanish eclectic” style home in Berkeley was named a city landmark in August.
The original, approximately 2,000-square-foot, three bedroom, 1-1/2 bath house was built at an estimated cost of $12,000, which is about $219,000 in today’s dollars. Its white stucco walls and red tile roof pays homage to Andalusian and Mexican architecture.
The home was also landmarked for notable residents Dorothea and Adolph Kunsmiller who moved into the property when it was built. Dorothea served for 24 years on the Denver Public School Board; the Kunsmiller Creative Arts Academy, a magnet school in Harvey Park, is named after her. Adolph, meanwhile, served for more than 60 years at the American National Bank, and is noted for his work in spearheading antidiscrimination legislation.
A 1954 article in the Intermountain Jewish News extolled Adolph’s 49 years with the American National Bank, and how “he has been a good friend of the Jewish community and a powerful factor in Denver’s progress,” the landmark application reads.
University Park Thematic Historic District
The Buchtel Bungalow, at 2100 S. Columbine St., is owned by the University of Denver. It’s one of the 17 structures landmarked in the new historic district. (BusinessDen file)
In April, 17 structures near the University of Denver were named part of a non-contiguous historic district. It was the 60th historic district in Denver, not including individual landmarked properties, and only the second non-contiguous district in the city, along with the Downtown Denver Historic District.
The area includes mostly houses, with a couple observatories and a church that pay homage to the development of the university and the surrounding area. The scattered nature of the district reflects how the neighborhood came about, built in piecemeal fashion.
One interesting wrinkle was the university’s opposition to one of its buildings being included in the district. DU said the inclusion of the “Butchel Bungalow,” the house of the university’s third chancellor at 2100 S. Columbine St., would make the property more difficult to sell, something that it has considered in the past. But the Denver City Council declined to remove the building from the district.
The home, used in recent years as “a housing option for DU leadership as they move to Denver,” cannot be used for educational purposes, the school said in a previous BusinessDen report.
Map of the new historic district. (Public records)
