The low brick building on the northwest corner of Grant Street and East Seventh Avenue began life in the early 1900s as a grocery store; it was built to take advantage of a new streetcar line running along Seventh, straight through a neighborhood where the Colorado Governor s Mansion had also just been completed.
Over the decades, many businesses have come and gone from this corner, but for the past twenty years, it has been the site of restaurateur Frank Bonanno s growing group of restaurants and bars. Mizuna opened at the west end of the property in 2001, followed soon after by Luca (facing Grant Street), Bones (which became Lou s Food Bar in 2019) and Vesper Lounge (which took over the venerable Lancer Lounge). Although the four businesses have separate addresses, their spaces are all owned by one company, the Sherman Agency, which recently informed Bonanno that it was considering options for the future, including the possibility of demolishing the structure.
Generations-old family businesses work to uphold their family s livelihood, legacy during pandemic
Posted at 1:41 PM, Jan 12, 2021
and last updated 2021-01-12 17:04:50-05
Small businesses continue to struggle amid the pandemic, including family businesses that have had generations of success.
With the most recent round of stimulus money on the way, and 10 months into this pandemic, we wanted to ask them one simple question: how are you doing?
âTerrible,â said John Ellwood, who owns a dry-cleaning business near Boulder, Colorado with his wife of nearly 30 years, Wendy. âItâs funny, we havenât paid ourselves since June, and I never thought Iâd collect unemployment, [but] weâre collecting unemployment.â
Despite the partisan battles in 2020, there was one thing we could all agree on: Let s order takeout. As it turned out, it became our civic duty to ensure that restaurants, where 10% of Coloradans work, could survive the pandemic.Â
Politicos statewide were happy to tell us where they got their favorite meals, so we ve compiled them all into one smorgasbord of options.
Let s dig in:
U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette, D-Denver:
A patron enters Cherry Cricket, located in Denver s Cherry Creek neighborhood. Courtesy of Cherry Cricket via Instagram The Cherry Cricketâs burger and frings have been a family favorite for decades.