Denver sits at exactly one mile above sea level — a fact stamped into the marble of the Colorado State Capitol floor — and the city’s ambitions have always matched that elevation. This Denver walking tour traces a route from the historic Larimer Square through the revitalised Lower Downtown brewery district and into the River North Art District (RiNo), where repurposed warehouses host the largest concentration of craft breweries and street murals in Colorado. Channel Let’s Go for a Walk filmed the full route in 4K HDR, giving the red-brick facades and painted walls the vivid treatment they deserve.
About This Walking Tour
Let’s Go for a Walk filmed this 4K HDR route along one of Denver’s most visually rewarding corridors. The walk begins at Larimer Square, Denver’s most historic block, where the Victorian-era commercial buildings — the oldest surviving street in the city — have been converted into a restaurant and boutique strip while retaining their original facades of decorative ironwork and brick. The video captures Larimer’s characteristic string lights and carved-stone frontages, which read especially well in HDR. From Larimer the camera moves through Lower Downtown (LoDo), the warehouse precinct around Union Station that was largely derelict in the 1980s and is now one of the most active urban entertainment zones in the Mountain West. Union Station itself — a Beaux-Arts landmark from 1881, recently renovated as a hotel and food hall — serves as a visual anchor for the LoDo section. The walk then continues north across the South Platte River into RiNo, Denver’s River North Art District, where every second building seems to carry a large-scale commissioned mural. Let’s Go for a Walk accompanies the footage with calm background music rather than narration, creating a meditative viewing experience that allows the city’s visual character — the blue skies, the snow-capped Front Range in the distance, the warm brick and vivid painted walls — to speak for itself. HDR format suits Denver’s high-altitude light, which is notably clearer and more luminous than at sea level.
Highlights of Denver
Larimer Square, on the 1400 block of Larimer Street, is the only intact Victorian commercial block in Denver and was saved from demolition in the 1960s by developer Dana Crawford in one of the earliest historic preservation campaigns in the American West. Union Station’s 1914 Beaux-Arts main hall, now operating as a boutique hotel, has become the social hub of LoDo — its Great Hall functions as a public living room open to all, with bars, coffee counters, and restaurant outlets operating under the soaring ceiling. Confluence Park, where Cherry Creek meets the South Platte River a few blocks west, has a kayaking wave park that sees use most days of the year. The Denver Performing Arts Complex, one of the largest of its kind in the United States, occupies several blocks in a glass-roofed complex near Larimer. RiNo’s murals are a major draw: the neighbourhood has attracted internationally recognised street artists and the painted walls cover entire warehouse facades. Denver has over 100 craft breweries within city limits — USA Today has repeatedly ranked RiNo as the best American neighbourhood for brewery tourism. The Denver Art Museum, housed partly in Daniel Libeskind’s titanium-clad Hamilton Building, holds an outstanding collection of Native American and Western art.
A Brief History of Denver
Denver was founded in 1858 after gold was discovered at the confluence of Cherry Creek and the South Platte River. Within a year, a city of wood-frame buildings had risen on the raw prairie. Denver became the territorial capital of Colorado in 1867 and state capital when Colorado was admitted to the Union in 1876. The city’s growth was driven by successive mining booms — gold, then silver — and by its position as the main supply depot for the mountain mining camps of the Rockies. The 1880s silver boom produced much of the Victorian architecture still visible in LoDo and the historic residential neighbourhoods to the east. A bust followed the demonetisation of silver in 1893, and Denver cycled through boom and bust phases through the twentieth century, with the 1970s oil economy and the 1980s oil bust leaving visible marks on the city. The most recent transformation — the repopulation of LoDo and RiNo, the legalization of recreational cannabis in 2012, and the arrival of major technology employers — has made Denver one of the fastest-growing cities in the United States since 2010.
Practical Tips
Denver International Airport is connected to Union Station downtown by the A Line commuter rail, a 37-minute journey. From Union Station, Larimer Square is a 10-minute walk south. The 16th Street Mall runs through the city centre and is served by a free bus shuttle. RiNo is about 20 minutes on foot north of Union Station across the South Platte River, or a short ride on the No. 44 bus. Denver’s altitude — 1,609 metres — can cause mild altitude sickness in new arrivals; drink extra water, moderate alcohol intake on your first day, and allow a day to acclimatise before strenuous activity. Visit May through October for the best weather; the Rockies are visible from downtown on clear days and create a dramatic backdrop for any city walk.
Watch & Explore More
Denver’s mountain-edge energy has parallels in other high-altitude Western cities — compare our Los Angeles Venice Beach and Griffith walk for a different kind of West Coast urban experience, or explore the architecture and lakefront of Chicago’s Riverwalk. More walk videos at @walkingtoursvideoscom.