On March 16, she was forced to shutter her doors until further notice. It wasn’t long before she realized that her venue faced “impending doom.” Owner Paula Vrakas recalls stressing out as she first learned about COVID-19 on the news and watched Colorado start to close. While the venue has pulled that off so far, with COVID-19 cases on the rise, no federal relief in sight and the threat of more stay-at-home orders looming in Denver, the Roxy’s fate is far from certain. The Broadway Roxy Owner on the Worst Day of Her Lifeīy Katrina Leibee, Westword | The Broadway Roxy, at 554 South Broadway, is one of many venues struggling to stay afloat through the pandemic. If I went around the world five times, I wouldn’t have seen the humanity and all I saw in the twenty years I was there.” My father always said if he was reincarnated or came back, he would do the same thing over again. “When I originally took over the Zephyr from my dad, I thought it would be a couple of years,” Melnick recalls. Once a mainstay for mid-century tourists traveling Route 40, more recently it had become a hangout for workers at the nearby Anschutz Medical Campus as well as old-timers in the rapidly changing neighborhood. The Zephyr Lounge was a legendary family-owned bar, restaurant and venue that Melnick inherited in 2003 from his father, Barry Melnick, who’d purchased the building at 11940 East Colfax Avenue in 1947. “The train that never leaves Aurora will be leaving the station.” The Zephyr Lounge Reaches the End of the Lineīy Kyle Harris, Westword | “It is with a heavy heart that after 73 years in business, the Zephyr is now closed,” announced owner Myron Melnick on social media on November 1. He plans to open a Sexy Pizza with a yet-to-be-disclosed Denver brewery, a music venue and more. Sexy Pizza founder, former cannabis mogul and 2018 Denver mayoral hopeful Kayvan Khalatbari, who has been a major supporter of comedy, DIY publishing and other creative undertakings in Denver, has spent the past few months buying properties to help turn the town into a cultural hotspot filled with affordable housing and worker-owned businesses. It’s seen bloody miners’ strikes, served as the gender-reassignment capital of the world, ridden the oil industry roller coaster and, most recently, become a cannabis lover’s paradise, with around two dozen dispensaries - one for roughly every 400 people in town.Ĭonservation-minded developer and visionary Dana Crawford has been active in Trinidad since 2016, working on restoring the old opera house, the Fox West Theatre - which has hosted a series of live-stream concerts - and other sites. Split by I-25 and connected by major highways to New Mexico, Kansas and Texas, the old coal-mining town has had a turbulent economy that has boomed and busted since it was founded in 1870. The latest in a string of Denver businesses to announce a presence in the town: Mutiny Information Cafe, a bookshop, record store, all-ages DIY hub and community gathering spot at 2 South Broadway. He now says he has a stronger resolve to keep the business going to honor the Denver community's goodwill.It’s not business as usual inside the Broadway Roxy (photo by Paula Vrakas)īy Kyle Harris, Westword | The southern Colorado city of Trinidad, population under 9,000, could become the state’s next cultural hub - if a who’s who of Denver entrepreneurs, cultural mavens and preservationists have their way. Norris said he paid the bill first thing Wednesday morning. "We're just filled with gratitude and humility and a little embarrassment." from losing the business and crying on Thursday to weeping with joy by Saturday night because of all of our customers coming through like that," said Norris. More than 1,000 people donated money to cover the shop's unpaid taxes. His customers weren't letting the cafe close without a fight. The problem became too big for him to handle and he ended up owing the city more than $42,000. The owner, Jim Norris, said that setbacks from the pandemic, vandalism and now inflation ballooned. The comics and coffee shop has been a staple on South Broadway for years. The Mutiny Information Cafe has reopened its doors less than a week after it was seized by the City of Denver.
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