Walk down Larimer Street this week and the headline writes itself. A new restaurant from one of Denver's most recognizable chefs is about to open in a space that sat dark for three years. That's the version of this story every food blog in town will run. It's true, and it's also not the interesting part.
The interesting part is what the chef did on his way in the door: he renewed his other lease on the same block for another ten years. That's not a press release kind of move. That's a bet a man makes only after watching a block long enough to know exactly what he's betting on.
The space that sat empty for three years
If you've walked past 1401 Larimer Street anytime since the old Ted's Montana Grill closed, you've walked past a problem nobody could quite solve. A sushi concept called Kiso was supposed to take the space over, and instead ended up evicted in 2025 owing roughly $50,000 in back rent. That's the kind of detail that doesn't make it into the glossy "coming soon" write-ups, but it's the reason that storefront has been one of the more stubborn vacancies on a block that otherwise doesn't have many.
Now it's Rōmyō, from chef Frank Bonanno, and the space is the 4,000-square-foot Miller Building unit that once tried and failed to be a sushi bar. Rōmyō opens in early September, seats 80 in the dining room, and adds another 40 seats on a patio that looks straight at the foothills. The menu is built around itameshi, the Japanese take on Italian cooking, and it borrows its best moves from Dumplin', the two-year pop-up Bonanno ran in Highland Square as what he's called an R&D run for this bigger idea. If you loved the whipped tofu dip with togarashi-dusted gnocco fritto or the burrata-and-kale dumplings in mushroom-chili broth, they're both on the opening menu, alongside teriyaki-glazed filet mignon skewers and a full lineup of sushi rolls built around unlikely pairings like salmon with mascarpone and white balsamic.
Why an 18-year tenant just signed for ten more
Here's the piece that actually tells you something about the block. Bonanno has operated Osteria Marco on Larimer Square for 18 years. Before he ever announced Rōmyō, he quietly renewed that Osteria Marco lease for another decade. A chef doesn't do that on a whim, and he's been candid about why the decision wasn't automatic. In a conversation with Westword timed to Mizuna's 25th anniversary, Bonanno described Larimer Square as an old block with real maintenance headaches under previous ownership, the kind of building problems that pile up when you're dealing with structures this old. What changed his calculus wasn't the buildings getting younger. It was the people managing them getting more responsive.
That's a different story than "new restaurant opens." That's a story about a landlord earning back the trust of its longest-running tenant, and that tenant responding by doubling his exposure to the block rather than hedging it. When Bonanno talks about the decision, he keeps coming back to history rather than hype.
"We're all about embracing past and future Denver," Bonanno has said of the move. "Larimer is particularly close to our hearts."
That's not marketing copy. Bonanno has said Osteria Marco, Green Russell, and Russell's Smokehouse are among the historic spaces his group has reimagined on this block, three concepts built inside buildings he didn't just rent, but actually helped save from becoming one more forgettable strip.
What else moves on the block this month
The restaurant opening is the loudest thing happening at Larimer Square in September, but it's not the only thing, and the rest of the calendar backs up the same read: this block is programming for the people who already live within walking distance, not just the summer tourist wave.
| Date | What's happening | Where |
|---|---|---|
| Sept 3 to 5 | Taylor Tomlinson, multi-night run | Comedy Works Downtown |
| Sept 4 | First Friday live music | Larimer Square, block-wide |
| Sept 19 | Denver BAZAAR, 30-plus local makers, free and dog-friendly | Larimer Square Historic District |
| Sept 23 | Final Movie Night on the Block, screening School of Rock | Larimer Square, outdoor |
| Date TBA, fall | Heritage Harvest, the block's official kickoff to autumn | Larimer Square |
| Monthly, no fixed date | Larimer Square Run Club, in partnership with Denver Athletics | Larimer Square |
None of this is new information if you follow the Larimer Square events page closely, but strung together it reads differently than any single listing does on its own. A three-night comedy headliner booking at Comedy Works tells you the block still pulls a crowd well past patio season. A free, no-ticket maker's market on a recurring third Saturday tells you the block wants you back next month, and the month after that. A running club is not a tourist attraction. Nobody flies into Denver to jog past storefronts with a group of strangers. That's a habit built for people who live here.
The tell nobody's writing headlines about
The clearest version of this whole argument isn't a September event at all. It's a tradition already on the block's annual calendar: Dana Day, a community celebration honoring Dana Crawford, the woman generally credited as the visionary behind saving this block from demolition in the first place. Larimer Square exists as a walkable, low-rise historic district today because someone fought to keep these Victorian buildings standing instead of clearing them for parking. A block that spends a day each year honoring its own preservation history is not a block optimizing for maximum foot traffic from out-of-towners. It's a block that knows its identity and is protecting it on purpose, the same instinct that apparently convinced Bonanno to stay.
Put the restaurant news and the calendar next to each other and the pattern gets hard to miss. The longest-tenured chef on the block just extended his commitment by a decade. The management fixed the trust problem that almost cost them that tenant. And the programming calendar, from a free Saturday market to a jogging group to a day literally dedicated to the block's own history, reads like an organization building repeat visits from people who already have a key to this neighborhood, not a one-time draw for people passing through.
If you already live downtown, none of this requires you to do anything except show up. Grab a spot at Rōmyō's patio once it opens and you'll be eating dinner with a foothills view that Bonanno specifically built the space around. Sign up for the Run Club if you've been looking for a reason to actually use those sidewalks past 15th Street. Bring a folding chair to School of Rock on the 23rd. The block is betting that you'll keep coming back, and the surest sign that bet is a good one is that the person with the most at stake just signed on for ten more years of it.
If you're the kind of person who reads a story like this and starts wondering what it actually means for a downtown condo or townhome you already own, that's a different conversation, and one worth having with someone who's watched this block as closely as we have. Explore more of what's happening across Downtown Denver, including what lock-and-leave living actually looks like here, or reach out to Kimber Ward directly and get a free home valuation to see where your place stands in a neighborhood that just keeps proving it's worth staying in.
