“I intentionally kept this under the radar,” he said. “I am irrationally protective of this concept.”

The Denver entrepreneur, best known for founding the bowling alley-meets-restaurant concept Punch Bowl Social, opened BARna at 1201 E. Colfax Ave. on June 17. The 10,000-square-foot bar serves tapas and shows soccer games.

Thompson said it will be a “soccer-first, not soccer-stupid” establishment. Broncos and Nuggets games will be shown, but so will that 9 a.m. Premier League matchup. The restaurant also has a basement filled with private karaoke rooms and unique games like Multiball, which is like a golf simulator but for soccer and dozens of other sports.

“I’m not casting aspersions at other versions of soccer bars, but most of them, the vast majority of them, are just Irish pubs and British pubs, and that is not for this generation. The concepts that I create are always for the 21- to 34-year-old,” said Thompson, 55.

BARna replaces the Irish Snug, an Irish pub and sports bar which closed there in 2022 after 18 years in business. Crazy Horse Kitchen and Bar also briefly operated in the space from 2023 to 2025.

Thompson did look elsewhere before settling on the Irish Snug space. RiNo, he said, had high rents and lacked consistent foot traffic. He also checked out buildings near his original Punch Bowl Social location on South Broadway. But he was insistent that a Colfax location was an ideal launching point.

“I believe in the Colfax renaissance associated with this huge bus rapid transit system,” he said. “It����ap a $280 million investment that can change a lot of opinions and doubts.”

It����ap a fitting metaphor for Thompson, who himself faces some old opinions and doubts about his work that he’d like to change.

In 2012, he launched Punch Bowl Social. At first, it went gangbusters. By 2019, the company was doing $120 million in revenue with nearly 20 locations averaging 24,000 square feet and had received a $140 million investment from Cracker Barrel.

But then the pandemic hit in 2020, plunging the restaurant industry into chaos. Thompson stepped down as CEO in August 2020. The business filed for bankruptcy that December.

The following year, he opened Three Saints Revival, an upscale Mediterranean joint next to Union Station. It closed in 2024, and Thompson was ordered to pay $500,000 to his landlord for breaking the lease. Court records show he has not yet paid that sum.

All the while, he was working as CEO of Camp Pickle. The business launched in 2022, aiming to bring pickleball courts and restaurants under the same roof. It purchased land for a location in Centennial and publicized other future openings elsewhere, but nothing ever materialized. Thompson said he left the company in 2024. Earlier this year, its land in Centennial was foreclosed on.

“I’ve been called an a–hole plenty of times, I recognize that. … No one’s ever called me a cheat, no one’s ever called me a fraud,” he said.

Thompson, who still lives in Denver, said his Union Station restaurant failed because he believed that the pandemic would end sooner and that downtown would quickly rebound, hence the name Three Saints Revival. He noted that the eatery won Westword’s best Mediterranean restaurant title in 2022.

Camp Pickle, meanwhile, was a much larger operation with many investors. Thompson said he was just the face of the brand and received all the flak as a result.

“There’s a discipline when you have to learn to pull the plug on something earlier on,” he said. “It doesn’t matter how long you fight, if you know it����ap not going to work, you don’t get bonus points for the good fight.”

The idea for BARna has percolated in Thompson’s head for years. At first, he flirted with doing something much larger, with soccer fields and a bar under one roof. But he settled on something more intimate.

“It����ap less than half to open up one of these than what it used to cost me to open a Punch Bowl Social,” Thompson said.

Thompson is hoping to open more BARna locations in Denver and around the country. He said Dallas, Texas, and Southern California make sense given the popularity of soccer there. Locally, LoHi’s youthful urban feel and southern Denver’s high concentration of soccer families seem ideal.

He’s 50/50 partners with British investor Luke Johnson, whom Thompson met in his final days at Punch Bowl Social. The two unsuccessfully tried to wrestle control of the business from a lender months before the bankruptcy.

Thompson said he’s operating this business a bit differently. He designed the entire interior himself, down to the color palette. The interior features a hodgepodge of antiques and soccer motifs wrapped in Spanish finishes. A large, ornate arch over the bar is based on a famous market in Barcelona, for instance.

“There’s not a fiber in this place I haven’t touched, and it����ap the first time I’ve done it like that,” he said.

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The spot, which billed itself as the first of its kind in the state, ceased operations on Monday, June 22, in anticipation of a 13,000-square-foot 1up location opening in Lakewood’s Belmar development.

“Our new home will occupy the former Lucky Strike space, at 415 Teller St. in Lakewood, and preserve much of the underground atmosphere that made the original LoDo location so memorable,” the . “It will be the largest 1up Arcade Bar we have ever built and will feature our most extensive collection of arcade games, pinball machines, redemption games, and attractions to date.”

The company decided to close the LoDo location at 1926 Blake St. in Denver, due to “the combination of changing conditions in downtown Denver and the increasing financial pressures facing the hospitality industry made it clear that it was time for the next chapter,” they wrote.

The original 1up opened on March 23, 2011, as the first full-service bar with a large collection of vintage video game cabinets, pinball machines, modest Skee-Ball lanes, and oversized Jenga blocks. A popular stop-off before and after Rockies games, concerts and downtown festivals, its subterranean lair became a reliable draw in a neighborhood otherwise dominated by TV-plastered sports bars and trendy, short-lived nightclubs.

“Today, gaming has become a major part of the hospitality landscape, and while the industry has evolved in countless ways, we are incredibly proud to have helped pioneer that movement here in Colorado,” owners wrote. “While our original location has closed, The 1up Arcade Bar is not going away. Our Colfax, Greenwood Village, and Westminster locations remain open and will continue serving the communities that have supported them for years.”

The closure hits just as two other LoDo businesses shutter, including the Rock Bottom Restaurant & Brewery on 16th and Curtis streets, and Church and Union on 17th Street, one of four restaurants from Jamie Lynch of “Top Chef” fame.

in RiNo and in Five Points are two of the four bars contending for ‘Best New U.S. Cocktail Bar’ at the , the competition announced earlier this month.

That means Denver has a 50% chance of bringing home the title.

The Peach Crease Club, opened last November near Mission Ballroom, serves culinary-inspired drinks in an audiophile-friendly atmosphere. It����ap owned and operated by local powerhouse cocktail couple Alex Jump and Stuart Jensen. Rougarou debuted last August from the creative forces behind Yacht Club, another award-winning Mile High City haunt. The concept is billed as a tribute to the American South.

The other two finalists in the category are schmuck. in New York City and Vandell in Los Angeles. Winners will be announced at an in-person ceremony in New Orleans on July 23.

Started in 2007, the Spirited Awards celebrate “outstanding individuals, establishments, products, media, and leaders who continue to inspire the global cocktail community,” according to the announcement. The competition is part of the renowned , which convenes the world’s leading mixologists every summer.

“As we mark the 20th anniversary of the Spirited Awards, we are proud to recognize this year’s finalists and honorees whose creativity, dedication, and leadership have elevated cocktail culture around the world. Their contributions not only set new standards of excellence but also inspire the next generation of hospitality professionals,” Ryan Chetiyawardana, Spirited Awards International Chair, said in a statement.

Denver is no stranger to the spotlight there. In 2024, the hot dog-slinging dive bar Yacht Club was honored as the Best New U.S. Cocktail Bar. Yacht Club and two other Denver spots, Lady Jane and Semiprecious, were nominated as semifinalists in this year’s competition, as well.

Jump and Jensen of Peach Crease said in a social media post that the recognition was validating, given the work it takes to open a bar in today’s economy and because locals belly up to get more than just drinks.

“Bars have always been community hubs. Serving delicious beverages is only a small factor of what makes a world class bar,” . “We are proud to be a new pillar of community here in Denver alongside many other wonderful establishments that have laid the groundwork before us and continue to do so.”

The business will occupy an area at 3100 Brighton Blvd., next to the property’s office lobby entrance, according to a Wednesday announcement from Boston-based Beacon Capital Partners and Denver-based Elevation Development Group.

The 70- to 80-seat space will feature French influences alongside contemporary design elements.

“Everything I build is rooted in creating spaces that bring people together through thoughtful design, hospitality and atmosphere,” said Masters, founder of Hello Darling and Flora.

“The space at Steel House felt like the right place to create something lasting for the RiNo neighborhood, a place designed for connection, creativity and community throughout the day.”

Steel House was completed in 2025, featuring more than 300,000 square feet of office space and 12,000 square feet of retail space. Developers Beacon and Elevation acquired the land in 2019 and in early 2023.

Designed by Morris Adjmi Architects and Open Studio Architecture, the 12-story building also features a range of amenities, including a 13,000-square-foot outdoor terrace, a tenant lounge, a two-story gym, a rock-climbing wall, an indoor basketball court, a yoga studio, a conference facility for more than 200 people, a bike room with repair stations and outdoor terraces on every floor.

The project has attracted interest from several employers, including Oakland, Calif.-based tech firm Fivetran, which is expected to move into the building by October after signing a nearly 33,000-square-foot lease for a floor at the top of the property.

Additionally, BusinessDen reported late last year that Denver-based hospitality company Alterra Mountain Co. was also eyeing space in the industrial-style building.

The Brighton Boulevard corridor continues to emerge as one of RiNo’s fastest-growing mixed-use districts, according to the announcement.

With more than 7,500 residential units nearby and continued development throughout the corridor, the area is seeing increased demand for hospitality, retail and service-oriented concepts.

The , part of the esteemed Tales of the Cocktail conference in New Orleans, announced its roster of this week, which are essentially the semifinalists in the national competition categories. The awards, hosted by the nonprofit , “celebrate excellence across the global bar and cocktail industry,” according to the organization.

While many of the honorees hailed from cocktail powerhouse cities such as New York, Los Angeles and New Orleans, Denver made an impressive showing in the “best new U.S. cocktail bar” category. Out of 10 semifinalists, three came from the Mile High City.

Those include , a RiNo concept from local cocktail power-couple Alex Jump and Stuart Jensen; , a new bar in Five Points from the team behind the esteemed beverage haunt Yacht Club; and , a self-described “neighborhood bar” which came to Denver by way of Los Angeles, where ownership operates two other cocktail joints.

“What’s truly special about the Spirited Awards is that it’s voted on by peers in the industry,” Jump said in an emailed statement. “With three of the 10 Best U.S. Cocktail Bars in Denver, that says a lot not only about The Peach Crease Club, but also about our city’s thriving cocktail scene as a whole.”

, a cocktail staple of the Highland neighborhood since 2018, and were also nominated in the “best U.S. bar team” category. Both places have been recognized for national awards recently. Lady Jane was named an “outstanding bar” semifinalist for this year’s James Beard Awards, while Yacht Club won the title of Best U.S. Cocktail Bar at the 2024 Spirited Awards.

Nikolas Sparks, general manager of Semiprecious, contends that Denver deserves to be recognized among the ranks of other highly-regarded cocktail scenes across the country.

“Though Semiprecious has only been here for a year, this type of recognition for the Denver bar scene has been a long time coming,” Sparks said in an emailed statement. “The community here has been nothing but welcoming and supportive towards us since opening, and we’re honored to be recognized alongside so many of our local friends that are operating at such a high level.”

The Spirited Awards finalists will be announced on June 8 ahead of the awards ceremony, taking place on July 23 in New Orleans. See the full list of nominees at .

Lob closed its 12,500-square-foot restaurant, bar and entertainment business at 1755 Blake St. at the end of March. It opened two years ago.

“Traditionally, Lob has been a go-to corporate hub for team building during the week and a lively social hot spot on weekends. However, balancing those two worlds proved trickier than we anticipated in Denver,” co-owner Andrew Hodd said in a written statement to BusinessDen.

“The reality of high office vacancies deeply impacted our weekday corporate crowd, while quiet event-free evenings made it hard to generate momentum.”

Lob combines the classic lawn game of bocce with a nine-hole mini-golflike course. Each participant gets two balls for each “hole” and has to throw them, one by one, as close as they can to a stake at the end of the track. The closer to the stake, the more points.

Lob, which stands for “Love of Bocce,” opened in Toronto, Canada, in 2018. The Denver spot, which launched on the Rockies home opener in 2024, was the company’s second location. Hodd said at the time that the build-out cost $3.8 million.

“This one is way more polished,” Hodd said then. “The location is prime.”

The spot also had a full bar and restaurant, serving burgers and chicken sandwiches. There was even a small pro shop inside.

Despite the disappointing stint, Hodd reiterated this week that he believes in the future of LoDo.

“While we wish we had approached this market differently, it hasn’t shaken our belief in this neighborhood. We absolutely admire and believe in the long-term potential of LoDo, and we respect the incredible investments the city continues to make in the area.”

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Her bar , which she debuted with husband Gil in 2021, is moving southwest within Denver from 3759 Chestnut Place to 3500 Delgany St., where it will open on June 19.

She’ll slide into the ground floor of The Catalyst building in RiNo to a space that was formerly occupied by RiNo Grill & Pizza.

When Cdebaca opens River’s second location, she’ll add breakfast, lunch and dinner to a drink menu known for its “power hour” where patrons can get a beer or a pickle shot for $1 from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. On Delgany, Cdebaca said she’ll be adding a $5 spaghetti pitcher to the daily ritual, something that used to be popular in bars in the ’70s and ’80s.

As for her full menu, which was made with the help of Smok Barbecue’s Bill Espiricueta, she said it����ap going to be a simple slew of items where “everything’s awesome.” River will serve pastas, steaks, salads and even Mexican food using Cdebaca’s green chile recipe.

For breakfast, her mother’s blueberry pancakes will be the star of the show alongside bacon/sausage or egg plates and biscuits and gravy offerings. She’ll start out only serving those during Sunday brunch but expects to be seven days a week three to six months in.

River’s cocktails will still have staples like a watermelon juice and coconut rum mix alongside other offerings like local wines. She also will have to-go charcuterie available so people can take munchies across the street to the RiNo Art Park.

“It sounds chaotic, but it����ap really not,” she said. “I just know what����ap missing in that neighborhood.”

River will also continue hosting events like NOLA night on Mondays, which is hosted by a local hip hop artist, along with open mics and EDM nights that the spot has become known for. Those will all start at 10 p.m. and run until 2 a.m., Cdebaca said, which is its closing time seven days a week.

Cdebaca said art is making up most of the $50,000 buildout cost, including several murals she described as “Greek and Roman mixed with cyberpunk.” The venue is keeping the tables and chairs as well as most of the kitchen equipment that RiNo Grill & Pizza used. Pool tables are being brought over from the old location.

River signed a 10-lease for the 4,500 square feet, which has a mezzanine and is bigger than the 3,000 square feet River currently occupies.

It����ap been a tsunami of a past few months for River, which thought it would have to close in September after Cdebaca’s uncle-in-law, who owns the property on Chestnut, agreed to sell the building to local developer Bernard Hurley.

Hurley declined to specify plans for the Chestnut parcel, but said that “it����ap going to continue to be a bar and it����ap gonna stay a local thing.”

With River’s lease up there this coming September, Cdebaca started looking at other options in the neighborhood, like across the street at 3501 Delgany,��where a brewery is slated to open, and on Brighton Boulevard across the street from The Source Hotel.

During her search, she was introduced to Dean Koelbel, whose Koelbel & Co. developed The Catalyst building, which opened in 2018. They looked at the space, which was home to national burger chain Kuma’s Corner before RiNo Grill & Pizza, and decided it was a fit.

“I was a little bit nervous because the other two businesses didn’t make it, right?” Cdebaca said. “But also they didn’t have the community that I have, so we have a head start in that.”

“They have a pretty big following,” Koelbel said. “They’re usually pretty packed and have concerts or some sort of themed event almost every single night.”

They’re also confident that the Art Park, which opened in fall 2021, and new apartment builds in the area will fuel traffic in an area Cdebaca said occasionally feels like the “stepchild of RiNo.”

“You got the park there, which opened during COVID and people are starting to realize that. And we’re starting to see a lot more leasing activity taking place in the Catalyst building itself,” Koelbel said, adding the building is about 80% occupied.

“People are back, people are wanting these walkable amenities,” he continued. “RiNo kind of fell off during and after COVID for a little bit. But it����ap coming back now.”

Cdebaca and her husband Gil, who is related to former councilwoman Candi Cdebaca and whose family has owned several bars in Five Points, are Denver natives who met while she was bartending.

The two have been riding that RiNo wave over the last five years, growing River’s revenue from $250,000 in its first year to $750,000 in 2025, its best year by far.

“That was just being a bar, and that����ap hard to do now because nobody’s just going to the bar.��And that����ap unhealthy anyways, people want to go to dinner,” she said. “So the fact that we get to be a restaurant now, I’m hoping we triple our revenue.”

BusinessDen staffer Matt Geiger contributed reporting. comes from our partner BusinessDen. ��

The for riders on Regional Transportation District buses plying one of metro Denver’s busiest roads. But for Sean Buchan, a co-owner of Cerebral Brewing, the Aurora phase could amount to a second economic body blow.

His brewery at East Colfax Avenue and Monroe Street in Denver has endured 18 months of construction, slicing 20% out of his bottom line as chain-link fencing and closed side streets have chased away customers.��Now Buchan will have to face a new round of disruption at one of his other breweries at Colfax and Florence Street — four miles to the east in Aurora.

“We saw people who would no longer drive to get here,” he said of the overhaul that began in Denver in the fall of 2024, generally starting at Broadway and moving east. “We saw a drastic year-over-year reduction in business.”

One consolation for businesses along the Aurora segment of the project is that planners are employing a totally different design than what’s being used for the 5.4 miles of Colfax from Broadway to Yosemite Street in Denver. The Denver segment is closer to a full “bus rapid transit” design — with dedicated bus lanes in the center of the street. But in Aurora, buses will migrate to the sides of Colfax and join the general flow of traffic once they cross the line dividing the two cities.

Travel time for bus riders is projected to drop by 15 to 30 minutes along the corridor from what it is on the Route 15 and Route 15L buses that serve East Colfax now. The new rapid bus system, promising easier boarding and a pickup frequency of less than every five minutes, is expected to launch at the end of 2027.

“While construction on the Aurora portion of the corridor is expected to move at a quicker pace and with less disruption than work occurring in Denver, we recognize that any level of construction activity can be challenging for nearby businesses,” said��Shawn Albert,��the deputy project director for the East Colfax Avenue BRT project.

Albert works for Denver’s Department of Transportation and Infrastructure, which is overseeing the entire effort.

“We will maintain access to all businesses during the construction, but some temporary pedestrian detours may be needed to accommodate specific construction activities,” he said.

Several businesses in the Denver section of the project have closed or moved because of the construction, including Misfit Snack Bar and Colfax and Cream, a coffee and ice cream joint.

Those who haven’t turned out the lights are on the edge, Buchan said.

“Everyone who didn’t close was��waving the white flag and asking for help,” he said.

Buchan received $15,000 from Denver’s , which he said covered about a month’s worth of payroll for his dozen or so employees. He has had to cut his staff’s working hours but hasn’t laid anyone off.

“It’s been pretty brutal,” he said.

Mixed-flow traffic, station improvements

Work on Aurora’s 3.1-mile segment of the Colfax project is set to kick off Wednesday with utility work near Havana Street, Albert said. Work will generally proceed from west to east over the life of the project, with the eastern terminus at Interstate 225, near the Anschutz Medical Campus.

More involved station work will begin this summer, Albert said. The total cost for the Aurora segment is nearly $26 million — $14 million of which comes from city funds.

Carlie Campuzano, Aurora’s deputy director of transportation and mobility, said there will be 22 stations in the city — 11 on each side of Colfax.

“There will be station improvements,” she said. “There will be a shelter added at every station.”

The stations will have ticket kiosks so that fares don’t have to be paid onboard the buses, saving time. Some of the stations will feature real-time arrival screens and level boarding, making it seamless for wheelchairs and people with disabilities to get on and off the buses.

Campuzano said that while the Aurora segment looks and works differently from the Denver segment, it meets the standards for what constitutes a bus rapid transit system.

“For BRT, there’s a menu for different strategies,” she said.

According to , the organization posited that there is no single way to design a project, saying “… flexible systems are important, especially since many BRT systems operate in dynamic urban environments.”

“While a majority of BRT (lines) … operate at least a portion of the system in some form of dedicated bus lanes (median, side, or curb-running), a majority also have a portion of the system that also operates in mixed flow, which highlights the flexibility of BRT,” the organization said.

Mixed flow is what Aurora is getting, meaning the buses will ride with the overall traffic flow on Colfax rather than in a bus-only lane. But buses will receive priority signalization at intersections — “an early green or an extended green time,” according to Campuzano — to keep them moving swiftly.

Jill Locantore, the executive director of the pro-transit , is disappointed that the design on the Denver side of the project didn’t extend into Aurora.

“I think it’s a misnomer to call it bus rapid transit in Aurora without dedicated bus lanes,” she said. “When the buses are running in mixed flow, it will not be rapid because the buses will be stuck in traffic.”

Locantore holds out hope that if BRT notably improves the transit experience on the 8.5-mile corridor over the next few years, the side lanes of East Colfax in Aurora could eventually be turned into exclusive bus lanes.

“Making it a dedicated bus lane just takes paint and signs,” she said.

The reason behind Aurora’s less-robust approach to BRT lies beyond the dynamics of East Colfax itself, said Doug Monroe, RTD’s manager of corridor planning. While the Denver stretch of the project is buttressed by alternating east-west routes to help relieve traffic on Colfax — East 13th and 14th avenues to the south and East 17th and 18th avenues to the north — Aurora’s street grid is different.

“Aurora does not have that capacity on their parallel street network,” Monroe said. “The city was concerned about impacts to traffic on Colfax.”

Up to 35 articulated buses — larger versions of a typical city bus — will move through the entire Colfax BRT corridor on any given day, Monroe said. While much of RTD’s ridership was decimated by the agency’s orders to severely restrict capacity on its buses and trains during the coronavirus pandemic, Monroe said the Colfax corridor has bounced back faster than the system as a whole in recent years.

It now has 16,000 to 17,000 daily riders, he said, compared to nearly 22,000 before the pandemic restrictions.

“Colfax is the busiest bus line in the system,” Monroe said.

Not a one-size-fits-all project

Shoshana Lew, the executive director of the Colorado Department of Transportation, is comfortable with the lack of design continuity between the Denver and Aurora segments.

“There are pros and cons to each approach,” she said in an interview with The Denver Post.

Other bus rapid transit corridors in metro Denver that are under construction, such as the , or in the planning stages, like Federal and boulevards, aren’t carbon copies of each other, Lew said.

“I think it’s phenomenal that each city is taking the lead in what it looks like,” she said. “None of these are going to be one-size-fits-all for all areas.”

Aurora’s BRT efforts come at a time when the city is making efforts to rejuvenate the Colfax corridor, which has struggled with crime and underinvestment for years. Last fall, Aurora voters approved the formation of a , which will have the power to draw on growing tax dollars in the form of tax-increment financing to invest in the corridor. The goal is to support small businesses, housing, safety and neighborhood improvements.

As the overall Colfax BRT project hit its brewery owner Buchan said he was worried about how his Aurora location would be impacted once the machines and work crews moved into place.

“I think some of the damage has been done — people see Colfax as hard to navigate,” he said.

Cerebral Brewing in Aurora, which opened in 2022 as an offshoot of the original Denver location, serves as the company’s production facility. It also has a taproom that Buchan hopes will remain a neighborhood gathering spot.

Despite being impacted twice by construction over the course of the project, Buchan says he’s a transit supporter and hopes bus rapid transit, once up and running, will inject life into the corridor and benefit the businesses that make Colfax, Colfax.

Even finding the space is a word-of-mouth affair, as the owners — the same people behind Pon Pon Bar in River North — have foregone any advertising or social media pushes. “We started Pon Pon the same way … and it kind of grew,” recalled Andy Rauworth, the mastermind behind Pigeon. “I think that’s the beauty of it, there’s a little mystery to it.”

Rauworth, who owns Pigeon, 1431 N. Ogden St., with Eric and Alison Corrigan, was previously part-owner and general manager at Pon Pon, but is now solely invested in his new space. Nearly everything inside Pigeon was handmade by the team – like the bar’s concrete backsplash that Rauworth poured himself, and the light-up chess board tabletops he created in his garage.

“We’re not trying to do a flash in the pan kind of vibe here,” he shared. “It’s why it’s all built out of concrete – everything’s here to stay. We’re very set in this environment.”

Rauworth began visualizing Pigeon in 2017, hoping the concept would be somewhat healing after many years of working in the bar scene. “I’m at an age where I want to get away from the party life,” shared the 30-something.

“We saw this location as kind of a hole in the community. There’s our classic stretch of dive bars, and I love them, but there’s a void for cocktails and something a little bit less anxiety-inducing,” he added.

The business arrives amid a wave of new vinyl-focused “listening” bars in Denver, including Peach Crease Club near the Mission Ballroom and Malinche Audiobar on Platte Street. However, Rauworth is quick to distinguish Pigeon from other vinyl joints.

“There’s definitely a hi-fi listening bar trend…it seems like these things are popping up every week,” Rauworth shared. “[Pigeon] isn’t a hi-fi bar, even though this system is incredible. But we’re not setting out for it to be anything like a Japanese listening bar. We’re not trying to catch the wave on that.”

Instead, the focus is on “getting people off their phones and socializing,” Rauworth said, referring to the chess boards and screen-less nature of the space. “Even the seating is set up this way to kind of squish people together. The bar is brought closer in to squeeze the space … when you’re sitting this close to someone, you’re probably going to engage.”

While Pigeon leans laidback, don’t get the wrong idea. Rauworth insisted it gets more lively after hours, just not in the way that you need to scream over people to have a conversation.

“We’re in it for the long haul, we’re not trying to fire it up and blow doors off this thing,” Rauworth expressed. “It’s not set up to be a cash cow; it’s a passion project, so I hope people see that.”

The cocktail menu is inspired by everything from Greek herbal remedies to Chinese white tea.

But there are also non-alcoholic beverages in the form of old-fashioned sodas mixed by hand with house-made syrups. Flavors include lemon lime, a cola based on a 1955 recipe, and a Belfast-style ginger ale dating back to the 1870s. There are also rotating seasonal flavors, think grapefruit for palomas and pine needle soda in the winter.

Pigeon assistant manager Travis Rice, who is the man behind the sodas, got the idea from his first job working at a soda fountain in Broken Bow, Neb., while in high school.

“I was just thinking of that concept, and realized I haven’t ever seen a bar do the handmade soda thing. So that kind of opened a can of worms,” he said. “It’s just a fun way to explore American soda fountain history and offer something a little bit more unique.”

Eventually, they will also venture into coffee, with plans to launch “study hall” hours, akin to happy hour but designed for focus, where guests can write, work, or just plug in and settle in.

Tucked away in the back of the space is a food counter simply named Toad. Run by Elliott Delka, this is the chef’s first solo project. Inspired by Japanese techniques and regional sourcing, the small menu is rooted in Colorado ingredients, from locally milled grains to heritage-breed pork raised on small family farms, and items like gyoza and tofu katsu.

Delka leases the counter space from Pigeon, and it operates like a hidden extension rather than a traditional restaurant.

“We’re even more of a hole in the wall than Pigeon,” said Delka. “The people who are called to the more warm lights in the back find his other special thing that’s happening. And it����ap a cool service to offer a bar concept – you’re not a sit-down restaurant, you’re not going and being hosted at the door, it’s more free-flying.”

Pigeon is located at 1431 N. Ogden St. Its hours of operation are 4 p.m. to midnight Sunday, Monday, Wednesday and Thursday, 4 p.m. to 1 a.m. Friday-Saturday, and closed on Tuesday. Toad is open from 4 a.m. to midnight Wednesday-Saturday, 4-10 p.m. on Monday, and is closed on Sunday and Tuesday.

This time around, it’s a new outpost of Soda Club, a wine bar that Death & Co.’s Ravi Derossi and wine director Drew Brady first opened in Manhattan in 2021. Soda Club is a Michelin Guide-rated “Bib Gourmand” restaurant for its price and quality.

The pair will also add handmade pastas at the hotel, 1260 25th St., in a space last used by Super Mega Bien, which shuttered this year amid a legal dispute. They expect to open for business by August.

“When we decided to expand Soda Club, Denver was our first choice,” Derossi, who is from Colorado, said in a statement. “It����ap exciting to bring this vision back to my home state in such a vibrant location.”

The name Soda Club, according to the Michelin Guide’s , “is derived from Italy’s tradition of hand-crafted sodas; and its spirit from the turbulent Prohibition era.

“There are also natural wines to accompany the seasonal, deftly executed vegan dishes,” the guide says of the original East Village restaurant, led by executive chef Amira Gharib.

Fresh pasta dishes that change seasonally and “pinsa”, a traditional pizza with a lighter crust made from rice and wheat flours, will be on the menu at the Denver location. At some point, Derossi and his team would like to conduct lessons on pasta-making.

Death & Co. opened in 2018 as the inaugural cocktail bar of the Ramble Hotel. Like the bar in New York City, it has earned nods for its stylish approach, including being named one of North America’s 50 best bars by the World’s 50 Best rankings in 2022.