If you've been driving north on Colfax, you may have seen Red Room's sign to your right as you near Logan Street. It's urban design of glinting metal and and warm red signifies what's inside, artistic flair blended with cocktails and tasty fare. A fairly new bar and restaurant to this neighborhood, which is mostly populated by colorful personalities and professions that make Colfax what it is. But that's also what makes a city in and of itself, that mixture of rough and rich, glamorous and gritty, real and risqué. This is why Red Room fits so well into their new setting.

This urban tale actually started back in day of the Broadway Brewing Company, where Brian Sommatino, co-owner of Red Room, helped to open a new bar with Andy Stustz of Wyncoop Brewery in 1994. The Broadway, now the Flying Dog Brewery, had an out of the way address. Despite this, Brian boasts they "got a really cool crowd in the middle of nowhere. In 1994, there was nobody there, so they called it NoDo because it was so far north."

In addition to getting the standard fare of a pool table and a cool bar, Brian and Andy also took advantage of the personality and creative talents of their patrons and neighbors, "The art community thrived in that area since that's where most of them lived and worked, in addition to the bike messengers and those that lived in the warehouses. So we started doing art shows." Two of those artists were John Crandall and Chris Lewis, which Brian states, "were heavily into the art community."

John and Chris set up a cousin deal at the Broadway, taking responsibility for securing and changing out different artist's works every six weeks in exchange for a running tab of Guinness. Not a bad deal either way. So the support of artists started there, and expanded to his future employment residences.

At the time, Wyncoop Brewing and Flying Dog owned the Broadway until it was sold in 1998. Brian didn't jive with the new management, so he decided it was time to go. The timing was good, since one of the major shareholders in Wyncoop, John Hickenlooper, had his eye on another endeavor, The Goosetown Tavern is located on Colfax, right across the street from the Bluebird. "I brought all my boys that I worked with down there [at the Broadway], and we got this place going."

Goosetown is a favorite hang out with me and my compatriots. I first discovered the neighborhood bar when I first landed in Denver, meeting Peter Ore from NIPP to interview him about the Stop the Hate, Learn to Skate Benefit for 911 at the Bluebird. Later, I found that I shared my enthusiasm for the Goosetown with many of by other drinking buddies. Goosetown has a real easy going feel, from the people hanging at the bar to the bartenders themselves, free of pretensions and judgments, with cool music playing on the juke box and a friendly game of pool going on in the back of the bar.

According to Brian, it was one of the bartending people who first discovered the space where the Red Room now stands. But this time when the powers that be at Wyncoop approached Brian with thoughts of opening the new bar, he wanted to have a stake, "I said I wanted to be part owner. Then I would do it. When they said, 'Okay,' we started on the process. It took us a year to come up with the concept of what we wanted. We built the whole thing up from nothing."

Continuing to work with Andy Stustz from the Broadway days, the reconstruction entailed taking over the Hollywood Poster shop to the left of the original space to make way for the bar area, then taking out the existing ceilings structure in exchange for the open, loft type configuration that stands today. "We wanted something totally different from [Goosetown]. We didn't want to open up the same thing that would take business away from ourselves. We wanted a more lounge type of atmosphere that has an awesome bar, serves really good food, and then at night, turns it into a cool club."

Part of that urban, artsy flavor includes the large works of art on the walls. To carry on the tradition of supporting the local art community, they now utilize the services of Wendy Pitton of WEDO Productions, who also handles changing out artist's works for Café @ Netherworld, Snakepit, and other bars, cafes, and salons, in addition to Goosetown and Red Room. So every six weeks, there are new pieces to view and choose from.

Red Velvet at the Red Room

The cool club starts this Tuesday night, July 9, with Red Velvet at the Red Room, the first weekly production of club music set to candlelight and rich tapestries. To set the ambiance, the place will be draped in red velvet from head to toe, or top level window treatments to drop-to-the-floor tablecloths, with gothic, rod-iron candelabras, served up with the downtempo, funky music platters from I. Yossi Goodman of You Know Me Productions.

For the opening, they'll also have Wyatt Earp (Case Del Soul/Hochokai Recordings), and Sante. Some fashion trends will take the floor via Buffalo Exchange, American Crew, Evolution, and more. Drink specials include $2 Ruby Red Martinis, Cosmopolitans, and Doggy Style (I'll have a double of that one).

Yossi originally approached Brian and Andy about a bartending job. Having left a his residence at Residanc when it changed over to Enigma, he just wanted to get a new start in a new place. After getting to know their business and what they wanted to do, it seemed a perfect match - taking his craft of producing unique dance and DJ nights to help them achieve their goal to transform their bar and restaurant into that cool club when the clock stroke 10pm.

They worked together to create the vibe for Red Velvet at the Red Room, with Yossi taking over the creative direction in the musical atmosphere department, and promoting the night to Denver's nightclub masses.

But That's Not All Folks

In addition to new nightlife activities, The Red Room will also be putting more emphasis on offering tasty delights to their patrons through the introduction of a new lunch and dinner menus. They'll be bringing a Spanish flair with their tapas style appetizers, adding rich fondues, including chocolate fondues on the dessert menu.

If you're in the mood for brunch, on Saturdays and Sundays you can feast of filling breakfasts and beverages to put back protein into your body from the night before - they offer eggs benedict, fruit platters, fondue, plus the Sunday fare of Bloody Marys, Mimosas, and Red Beer drink specials.

Towards the end of July or early August, they'll introduce another reason to stay after your Saturday meal with another club night, this time using Mile High DJs.

What really gets Brian excited is opening up their roof top patio next summer, "Sometimes I go up on the roof when the weather is really nice, and picture what it will look like. It's going to be awesome."

If you take the unique and creative vibe of The Red Room, and combine it with the laid back attitude of it's staff and clientele, it has so much potential to be the next favorite hangout. One thing I miss about San Francisco is not the huge club atmosphere of 1015 Folsom, it's the intimate, small dance clubs in the realm of Storeyville, Backflip, Snow Drift, or 550 Ritch, where people flock to vibe to good music with their closest friends - free from the lot of fake breast, pumped up dudes with bad pick up lines, and someone spinning the only techno track that's getting commercial radio air play.

Brian smiles in agreement, "That's the one thing we wanted to do, having a nice place without the pretentious attitude."