Project Walk-Through
Pura Vida Fitness & Spa; Denver, CO
Semple Brown Design; Denver, CO
By:  Nora Burba Trulsson
Photography by:  Ron Pollard

Porcelain and terrazzo tile combine to give the interior a cool, luminous look.

Residents of Denver’s Cherry Creek neighborhood may fondly recall a certain four-story building as the longtime home of the city’s beloved Tattered Cover, an independent bookstore. Today, the building is again imbued with life thanks to a new forward-thinking tenant, Pura Vida Fitness & Spa, and an architectural transformation that opened the structure to sunlight and urban views.

“This building started out in the 1960s as a department store,” explains Dalton Davis of Semple Brown Design, the architectural firm that handled the interior architecture and design for Pura Vida. “Then the building was occupied by the Tattered Cover.” When the bookseller moved out to new locations, the building’s owner wanted to renovate the structure.

The Denver office of Gensler was asked to renovate the building’s shell and core, replacing a windowless stucco facade with banks of windows that reveal the interior to the surrounding neighborhood and, in turn, flood the inside spaces with natural light.

In the women's locker room, lockers and vanity areas were kept low, allowing natural light to penetrate into the space. Acrylic art panels provide privacy from the street below.

Pura Vida’s owner opted to occupy some 33,000 square feet of the renovated 50,000-square-foot building, and came to Semple Brown Design with a desire to create a calming, serene facility for clients seeking a more personalized approach to both fitness and spa experiences. “The challenge was to create a unified space spread out over four levels and a basement,” points out Davis, who served as project architect on a Semple Brown Design team that also included architect Marc Applebaum as principal in charge and interior designer Sage Case, LEED AP. Another challenge, Davis notes, was that the street level of the building was largely occupied by a retail store, affording Pura Vida little ground-level exposure.

The Semple Brown Design team tackled the challenges by crafting a floorplan that placed a small entry and retail area at ground level to accommodate members who walk to the building. An elevator links that first floor to the main reception area on the second floor, which can be accessed from the parking garage. Locker rooms take up much of the second floor, along with administrative offices. The third level is largely group exercise rooms, cardio and weight equipment, and a spinning room, while the fourth floor houses the spa, with seven treatment rooms, manicure/pedicure facilities, a check-in area and retail space. The basement includes a staff lounge. Taking advantage of the building’s new transparent skin, the Semple Brown designers placed the group exercise facilities along the windows, so the building would become animated with people in motion, visible from the street and sidewalks below.

The building's former fire escape staircase was transformed into the new main link between floors with the installation of new custom railings, light fixures and, at each level, a window

While an elevator links all the levels, a staircase is the preferred mode of transportation. “If you’re going to a gym, you shouldn’t really be taking an elevator,” says Davis. The Semple Brown Design team transformed what was once the building’s windowless fire escape staircase into a focal point by adding windows at each level, replacing old railings with new custom metal railings and using new custom light fixtures as accents.

Throughout the facility, cool colors of pale blue, white and brown add a sense of serenity and focus. A water feature in the main reception area provides a calming effect. Materials such as porcelain and terrazzo tile were chosen for their durability, while virgin rubber flooring and slatted wood ceilings help with acoustics. Maple, white oak and flamed oak flooring and details add warmth. Furnishings were chosen for their modern appeal, as was the artwork, which includes acrylic panels superimposed with abstracted nature photographs in the women’s locker room. The panels allow daylight into the space, but provide privacy from the street below.

Though the books and readers have moved elsewhere in Denver, the Cherry Creek building buzzes with Pura Vida activity. On any given day, club members participate in yoga classes, train core muscles with Pilates, break a sweat with spin or relax with a massage.

Pura Vida interior architecture and design: Semple Brown Design, 1160 Santa Fe Drive, Denver, CO 80204; (303) 571-4137 or www.sbdesign-pc.com

Sleek materials and simple lines mark Pura Vida's main reception area, where a water feature provides a calming effect

Shell and core architecture: Gensler, 1625 Broadway, Suite 400, Denver, CO 80202; (303) 595-8585 or www.gensler.com

Lobby Furniture: Bernhardt, www.bernhardt.com

Tile flooring: Daltile, www.daltile.com

Carpeting: Shaw, www.shawcontractgroup.com

Art panels: Lynnel, www.lynnel.com