The neighborhood, which has about 7,000 residents, is one of Denver’s oldest and is just to the south of the area where Denver was first settled in the 1850s. Many houses date from about 1900.
Interstate 25 runs north-south through the western part of the neighborhood. The RTD’s light rail line also runs north-south through the neighborhood and includes a station located at 10th Avenue and Osage Street. The neighborhood is sometimes called “La Alma/Lincoln Park”or the West Side.
The Santa Fe Arts District, on Santa Fe Drive between 6th and 12th Avenues (its primary retail and commercial corridor), includes more than 40 galleries, restaurants and shops. The “First Friday Art Walk” and the “Collectors’ Night” are monthly events in the district.
The Denver Civic Theater on Santa Fe Drive was opened in 1921 as a cinema house, one of Denver’s first silent movie theaters. The building was later used for various purposes (even as a meatpacking plant), before it was eventually renovated in 1993 as a neighborhood arts center containing two theaters (one with 332 seats, another with 134) and an art gallery. The venue has been used by local playwrights and a resident performance company for dramatic productions, and in 2010 became the new home of El Centro Su Teatro.
Institutions in the neighborhood include Museo de las Américas on Santa Fe Drive, the region’s first museum dedicated to the art and culture of Latinos; Center for Visual Art, Metropolitan State University of Denver’s contemporary art gallery and learning lab; Denver Health hospital complex; Denver West High School, the Asian and Hispanic Chambers of Commerce; Buckhorn Exchange, a 105-year old restaurant that holds the state’s first liquor license; and Sunken Gardens Park along Speer Boulevard. A former courthouse and district attorney’s office at the intersection of Speer Boulevard and Colfax Avenue was renovated into a Latino cultural and business center. Venerable Boulder, Colorado based community radio station KGNU opened a studio at 7th and Kalamath in 2006, when they began broadcasting in Denver on 1390 AM, located together with noncommercial media partner, Open Media Foundation.
Housing in the neighborhood includes many single family detached houses, including two-story brick Victorians, row houses, duplexes, brick bungalows and one-story stucco houses. Prominent housing developments include the Parkway Center apartment and condominium complex, with 1,050 units, at 12th and Galapago Street, Denver Tower Complex with condos, supermarket and offices (both fronting on Speer Boulevard from 14th to 12th).