Chewing gum, shoulders bobbing, headphones jammed on his back-twisted cap, DJ Green Lantern works the crowd at the Jet Hotel in LoDo at a party for Playboy Playmate Holley Dorrough, Miss April 2006, a soft-spoken Alabama girl teetering on strappy black stiletto heels in a black mini just inches longer than her cascade of blond hair.
“We gonna party tonight!” the DJ shouts to the crowd.
“I got an announcement. It’s my (bleeping) birthday. I’ll be smoking some weed later.”
The crowd roars, while the Playmate and her posse – gorgeous young blonds and spiky-haired Hollywood promoters – stand before the DJ, coolly observing his rap.
Some would say she’s retro-cool, an Alabama girl now gone Hollywood, Hefner-style.
And some would say he’s hip-hop cool, having worked as Eminem’s own DJ, produced singles like Ludacris’ “Number One Spot,” and scored a regular gig on New York’s Hot 97, the first all- hip-hop radio station in the country.
Others, however, would argue that anything in LoDo – anyone, anywhere, anytime – is not cool.
LoDo, they lament, has morphed into a magnet for “the bridge and tunnel” crowd (hipster-speak for suburban wannabes so uncool they’re not even trendy).
The DJ and the Playmate don’t know LoDo, but they do know the rules of cool.
“Cool is cool before it’s trendy,” says DJ Green Lantern.
“Some people try way too hard and overdo the coolness,” says Dorrough. “Then everyone starts doing it, and it’s ridiculous.”
So here you have it: the rules of cool. Effortless and exclusive, it’s a style of self-expression on the cultural fringe, a sense of discovery, something really fresh and exciting. When cool goes mainstream, it’s history.
Like a billionaire restlessly roving from one home to the next – Malibu, Manhattan, Aspen – cool constantly migrates.
Often fueled by artists seeking cheap rents in transitional neighborhoods, cool is urban pioneers braving blight for a loft with enough space to create.
This hipster cachet lures restaurants and retail, which is great, until critical mass hits.
“It may start out with a bunch of businesses that are really energetic,” says Andrea Dupree, program manager for Lighthouse Writers.
“But once people see there’s money to be made, a lot of those businesses get pushed out, and then it’s just capitalism. It loses the feeling of having an edge and secret knowledge.
“Once the masses discover it, it no longer is interesting to some people, and they feel they have to move on.”
More online: Learn what Denverites think is cool. denverpost.com/style
Staff writer Colleen O’Connor can be reached at 303-954-1083 or coconnor@denverpost.com
PIONeeRING aRTISTS
When artists and galleries were priced out of LoDo, many migrated to Santa Fe Drive, where they created a vibrant arts district. So now people are talking about its latest innovation: Nine10Arts, a trendy fusion of art and green building.
“Nine10Arts is the coolest thing,” says Denver developer Dana Crawford. “It’s a green-complex co-op for artists, with condominium housing and a neat little cafe. It’s so first-rate.”
She’s not kidding. Nine10Arts recently was named the 2006 Legacy Project by the national U.S. Green Building Council, lauded for its sustainable design as a civic gathering place for art and ideas.
And then there’s RiNo – short for River North Art District – that’s billing itself as “Denver’s creative edge.”
Never heard of it? Bounded by Interstate 70, Interstate 25, Park Avenue West and Lawrence Street, it’s home to sculptors, designers, art galleries, architects and studio spaces.
Like Orange Cat Studios, for example, which recently debuted short indie films by local filmmakers. Or the Denver Underground Film Festival, Blue Silo Studios and the artisan Bella Glass Studios – just to name a few.
aFTeR-HOURS CLUBS
Developers are pouring money into Upper Larimer, an edgy neighborhood also known as the Warehouse District, populated mostly by 20-something hipsters.
The Meadowlark Bar is swank and gorgeous, while the Larimer Lounge is considered Denver’s coolest rock club.
Upper Larimer is also home to many warehouse parties, legal and illegal.
Artist galleries and performance spaces are springing up in Upper Larimer, things like Café Nuba at the Walnut Room, a provocative mix of performance art, spoken word and indie film held the last Friday of every month.
The true vanguard, however, is Globeville, near the intersection of Brighton Boulevard and Broadway – a scene of after-hours loft parties, lots of scooter kids, and clubs like Rhinoceropolis and the Pink Elephant Warehouse, with performances, galleries and live shows. Less developed than Upper Larimer, it is Denver’s emerging avant-garde.
aNYTHING INDIe
Art, poetry, music, soul – indie coffeehouses drive the cult of cool.
“What’s really cool about a city is a culture of music and art, people getting together and having a good time,” says Philip Coombs, a 21-year-old with a 5-inch blue mohawk who plays in a punk/metal band and likes to hang at the Streets of London Pub in Capitol Hill.
Hipster hangouts include Karma, the organic cafe that bills itself as “a safe place for conscious living,” with its wild magenta door, fair-trade coffees and revolving artist shows presided over by people like DJ Moetavation.
There’s also the Urban Roadhouse, in the Warehouse District, with its funky decor and black-clad bohemians, as well as Duo and Z Cuisine in Highland and the trendy Zengo on Little Raven Street.
For pure creative-class mentality, it’s hard to beat the Blake Street Tavern in the Ballpark District, the watering hole for urban pioneers now moving into Denver’s burgeoning media-gulch scene.
And for the latest in retro cool, hipsters are flocking to Steuben’s, Denver’s new mid-century modern restaurant , where bohemians imbibe root beer floats, milkshakes and egg creams.
SKYSCRaPeRS & LOFTS
The Warehouse District is the new urban renaissance. A ghost town barely three years ago, it’s getting new residents almost every day.
“Lofts and townhouses are going up everywhere,” says Scott Campbell, head of the district’s neighborhood association.
There’s also talk of opening Larimer and Walnut streets to two-way traffic, which would change the character of the neighborhood even more – plus the arrival of a chain coffeehouse, always the bellwether of urban trendiness.
Other people are abuzz over the Glass House, where nearly 8,000 people signed up to receive information on its 389 units, due to open in January 2007 in the Central Platte Valley, a cluster of affluent condominiums and upscale retail.
Expect trendiness to spread rapidly when the Highland Bridge opens a few months from now, which will link Highland and Upper Platte with the Riverfront neighborhood.
Cool is also migrating north into the upper Curtis Park/Five Points/Ballpark neighborhoods, with their urban chic. This September, construction will start on the retro/industrial design condominium called 2999 Lawrence.
URBaN SHOPPING
“They say this is going to be the next LoDo,” says Sheryl Czipott, owner of Wine Complements on Platte Street, a cluster of shops so new that they’re still debating their neighborhood acyronym – HiLo, LoHi, HiDo.
Right now, they’re calling their own street “Upper Platte.”
Indie shops include Zen Dog, a pets boutique that sports lime-green walls and a jaguar-print sofa, and Metroboom, a style salon for men that offers the works: massage therapy, cut-and-color, personal shoppers and fashion consultants.
Home Sanctuary just opened three months ago, an urban-
chic home-decorating store created by Wade Richards, who chose this neighborhood after a year of sleuthing locations.
“I like the energy here,” he says. “It’s trendy, but not Cherry Creek trendy.”
Others cop their cool at the Tennyson Street shopping district in northwest Denver. “We love Zelda’s and buy gifts for our clients there,” says ad executive Cathey Finlon of the artsy-boho shop that trades in everything from home furniture to cowgirl memorabilia.
