THE NICHOLS BUILDING

The Nichols Building is situated on a long, narrow, 0.58 acre site at 1644 Platte Street, in north Denver.  This built architecture houses a range of commercial office tenants, but primarily provides space for high-tech startups. The Parcel faces northwest to Platte Street and southeast to the revitalized South Platte River nature and recreational corridor. These narrow edges give our project the unique opportunity for two front doors, and the building’s design springs from this relationship. The project becomes a conduit that connects the Central Platte Valley neighborhood to Denver’s growing urban core.

 

The building reads as a glass box that has been draped with opaque gray and blue metal panels. The elevations with the front doors are completely glass. The fenestration on the northeast elevation has a strategic rhythm that aligns with the interior spaces and also predicts some level of future development on the site to the northeast. The parti for the project focuses on connections of light and people horizontally across the site and vertically through the building. The project provides a vibrant stitch in the urban fabric of this rapidly evolving neighborhood.