An adventure park known as URWLD, pronounced “your world,” is coming to Globeville’s Fox Park development, offering a variety of sports activities and experiences under one roof.
The new 165,000-square-foot facility will offer 12 to 15 adventure sports, everything from ice climbing to surfing.
“Over the last 15 years, there’s been so much growth across what people call the ‘experience economy,’ you know, people wanting to take part in things,” said Justin Beavis, URWLD chief development and commercial officer and founder of UK-based Urban Legacies Limited. Urban Legacies is the creator of URWLD.
“Our whole business is anchored around getting people active in a fun and inspiring way, but encouraging people to do sports and experiences or activities that they wouldn’t usually do.”
Kevin Bacon, who serves as the group chief executive officer for URWLD, said they chose Denver to debut the adventure park because of how close it is to nature.
“When we train someone to climb or scuba dive or ice climb, particularly when the weather is right in Colorado, we want people to go and do it for real,” he said.
“We love the proximity to all of these wonderful things in the city, but we can provide the base camp for all of those activities, 365 days a year.”
Among the highlights of the $80 million development is a 15,000-square-foot indoor canyoning range. Project plans show this will be the property’s biggest attraction and will host several activities such as coasteering, canyoning, caving, rollgliding and scuba diving.
The venue will also include flexible workspaces, study areas, event spaces for gatherings and entertainment, retail options and about eight food and drink shops. In addition, the property will have an artisan coffee business featuring its own on-site roastery.
Plans are already in progress to expand URWLD across the country and internationally, including a site in Australia.
Bacon confirmed that discussions are underway for four additional sites in North America.
The company also plans to establish its global headquarters in Denver, with Fox Park being considered as a possible location.
Jose Carredano, managing partner of Fox Park, said construction on URWLD has begun with an estimated opening in late 2027 or early 2028.
“We have just finished the excavation and shoring of the Fox Park Plaza that goes right in front of URWLD, and we also finished the first controlled demolition of the facade where URWLD is going to go,” he said.
At the intersection of Interstate 25 and Interstate 70 in Denver’s Globeville neighborhood, Fox Park is a 41-acre mixed-use community development that will feature 12-story office towers, an over 240-room Virgin Hotel, more than 3,400 residential units, a 20,000-square-foot grocery store, a mix of retail offerings, entertainment and 14 acres of interconnected parks and open space.
The company’s adventure facility will be in the World Trade Center complex, repurposing the former 320,000-square-foot Denver Post printing facility that was vacant for more than a decade.
Vita Fox North LP, a partnership between Indianapolis-based Pure Development and Mexico City-based Interland, bought the site for $56.5 million in 2019 from longtime owners Woodspear Properties and Ascendant Development Corp.
“Fox Park has been under planning and development since early 2020,” Carredano said.
“We just want to do a new neighborhood that people can be proud of — this element of sport, entertainment and physical activity and challenge that URWLD brings to the whole Fox Park project is a great complement.”
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