When searching for a new office for his architecture firm, Blake Mourer insisted on finding something that was not move-in ready.
“It was really less about location, more about finding the right asset,” he said. “It’s looking for something that needed work, that I could improve.”
Mourer is the co-founder and principal at Open Studio Architecture, a local firm that has designed everything from new office buildings in RiNo and Cherry Creek to the revamped Mighty Argo Gold Mill in Idaho Springs, which will bring cable cars, an amphitheater and retail space to the tourist attraction.
Last month, Open Studio purchased 1120 Santa Fe Drive in Denver’s Lincoln Park for $1.4 million, according to public records.
The company will move there in February from its office at 1010 Park Ave. in Ballpark, which it built in 2018. Mourer’s firm only ever occupied half of the building, and sold it to a small-scale hotelier in the spring.
“Santa Fe is known for the arts and known for just being a pretty hip and vital kind of place. And so it’s a nice change of pace,” Mourer said.
The architect spoke with BusinessDen on the property’s 3,500-square-foot patio, which features mature trees and a colonnade, as construction work was underway in the building.
Mourer said the 4,000-square-foot building has “good bones.” It will soon feature oak floors, mud-in lighting and gyp ceilings.
“It’ll be very much like you’re hanging out in the lobby of a hotel … that’s just warm, simple, clean,” he said of how he’s remaking the interior.
A library will fill out the basement, while a kitchen, conference room and a pair of offices will wrap around the perimeter of the main floor. The main chunk of the office will be dedicated work space, with rows of three 8-foot-long oak tables, big enough to hold 18 people.
That’s notable, considering Open Studio has only about a dozen people on staff.
“We’ll probably add three to five people in ’26 and that’s based on the momentum I’m seeing now. … I don’t know if that’ll hold. There could be any number of things that would disrupt that,” Mourer said.
But for now, Mourer is focused on the build-out. He wouldn’t disclose the cost of the work, but public records state the renovations are costing $235,000. The firm looked all over Denver’s urban core for a new location, including places in LoHi and RiNo.
“We like all those neighborhoods for different reasons. Of course, we wanted to be central enough that our employees didn’t have too much of a new commute,” Mourer said.
Part of the reason for buying the building, though, is what someone else might be able to do with it down the line. The site is zoned for up to 8 stories, so it has the potential for development in the future, Mourer added.
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