475 Lincoln St. - Sink Combs Dethlefs

Submitted by garbanzito on Wed, 04/14/2010 - 09:23

Location

475 Lincoln St.

denver, CO

United States

39° 43' 25.6764" N, 104° 59' 10.626" W

description from the 2010 Doors Open Denver program:

This 40,000-square-foot building has been a car dealership and a roller-skating rink, which accounts for its 30-foot-high barrel-vaulted ceiling and length of 300 feet.

During the post-WWII years the structure became the Rainbow Ballroom, where Lowry soldiers danced and Eleanor Roosevelt once gave a civil rights speech. Later still it housed garment manufacturing operations. Now the building is owned by local architectural firm Sink Combs Dethlefs, specialists in sports venues with McNichols and Folsom on their resume. When the building was renovated in 2002, the rink’s wooden ceiling was “corn-blasted” as a healthier alternative to sandblasting, and original tempura posters for events at the ballroom (including a bubble-blowing contest) were found stuck as shims in the floorboards.