Denver’s New Populus Hotel Looks Like a Giant Aspen Tree

Urban Villages has opened a $100 million hotel in Downtown Denver modeled to resemble an aspen tree, which claims to be the “first carbon positive” hotel in the U.S.

The locally based developer opened Populus, a 265-room hotel at 240 14th Street, in the Golden Triangle near Civic Center Park, the Denver Business Journal reported.

The 13-story, 135,000-square-foot hotel at 14th and Colfax Avenue has two restaurants, a coffee shop and various meeting rooms.

Managed by Chicago-based Aparium Hotel Group, the property is the first hotel in Downtown to use “food cycling” technology from New Hampshire-based BioGreen360, which turns food waste from its restaurants into compost.

The gleaming white hotel, designed by Chicago-based Studio Gang, was built to resemble one of the state’s most recognizable trees.

The design was inspired by a hike through an aspen forest by architect Jeanne Gang, a founding partner of the design studio, and Grant McCargo, co-founder of Urban Villages.

“The hotel’s biophilic architecture and distinctive window shape … draws from characteristic patterns found on the tree’s trunks,” the Populus website states.

Rooms at the hotel start at $195 per night, according to its website. Several suites feature views of the Colorado State Capitol building.

Urban Villages aimed to build Populus as the country’s first carbon-positive hotel — a title the hotel claimed just days before its public debut. The hotel doesn’t offer onsite parking.

Its carbon footprint is offset through forest and agricultural collaborations that sequester more carbon than the building emits throughout its lifecycle, according to the firm, having a net positive impact on climate change.

It helped plant more than 70,000 trees in Colorado through a partnership with One Tree Planted and the U.S. Forest Service to re-introduce the Engelmann Spruce, a primary tree species diminished by beetle kill.

“When we started this project, our goal was relatively straightforward — we wanted to make sure that this project left the planet and our community in a better place than we found it,” Jon Buerge, president of Urban Villages, told the Business Journal.

Urban Villages, founded by Grant and Tom McCargo in 2006, has completed nearly $5 billion in real estate deals and developments, according to its website.

— Dana Bartholomew