Big changes at Civic Center are driving out the park’s popular Christkindlmarket in 2025, but multi-day concerts such as the Outside Festival will return this summer.
“We know the park has limitations so we’re excited about upcoming construction, but it’s going to hurt,” said Eric Lazzari, executive director of the nonprofit Civic Center Conservancy. “At the same time, long-term, it’s what’s best for the park and downtown Denver, and will allow more events to happen.”
Civic Center’s annual Christkindlmarket and Mile High Tree display, which just wrapped its 2024 season, will no longer have the space to hold another estimated 350,000 visitors for 2025, Lazzari said. As a result, the German American Chamber of Commerce, which operates the German-style Christmas market, said last week they would move this year’s event to the Auraria Campus — about 1.5 miles to the northwest.
Christkindlmarket producers declined to comment on revenue for this year as they tabulate receipts, but Lazzari said he believes the event will return to Civic Center after its time at Auraria.
The move is due to the Civic Center 100 Vision Plan, a renovation project that will place large portions of the park behind construction fencing when it breaks ground. The upgrades will include a new public “garden walk” in the center of the space at 101 W. 14th Ave. and a food truck court. The city also plans to redo parts of the Greek Theater to add an accessible entry (currently: concrete stairs) and install a memorial to the ADA activists known as the Gang of 19. Helmed by the Chicago-based architecture and urban design firm Studio Gang (which is also responsible for the Populus Hotel across the street), the plan is being coordinated by Denver Parks & Recreation and the Civic Center Conservancy.
The state is also spending $1.5 million to prepare plans for a pedestrian walkway and bridge that would connect the Capitol complex and Lincoln Veterans Memorial Park — across the street from Civic Center — in time to celebrate Colorado’s 150th birthday in 2026. The cost of that construction hasn’t yet been determined.
Currently, the park is “not well suited for daily and casual use,” according to a presentation from the city, despite hosting many large events such as Cinco de Mayo, Denver Pridefest and the Outside Festival. That last event will return for a second year, May 31 to June 1. It precedes the city’s Outside Summit (May 29-30). Find tickets at festival.outsideonline.com.
This year’s fest features a lineup of Red Rocks headliners and acclaimed artists including Khruangbin, Lord Huron, Sylvan Esso, Trampled by Turtles, Neal Francis, Waxahatchee, and more to be announced. An estimated 18,000 people attended in 2024, according to promoters, with about 25,000 predicted for this year.
Still, it’s going to be a mighty balancing act, Lazzari said.
“I love all the activations that have stepped up and developed since the park closed back in 2021, and it really has given Civic Center new life,” he said. “But we know in doing this for almost the past 20 years that the park has limitations.”
The biggest challenge, he said, is lopsided capacity. Events that already work well in Civic Center are either smaller, 10,000-capacity gatherings or whole-park programming that draws tens of thousands of people over multiple days. Lazzari wants to see more “in-between things” that will use the renovated park’s new mechanical infrastructure, which allows much quicker setup and teardown for events.
In-progress upgrades of the nearby 16th Street Mall, as well as a rapid-transit bus project that will shut down stretches of East Colfax Avenue, will eventually help Civic Center’s draw, he said. Until then, it’s going to be case-by-case. The Civic Center Eats food truck gathering will return this summer, for example, but at a different spot in the park.
“We’ve been through lean times, during the pandemic and our whole-park shutdown, and we’re making sacrifices for this project,” Lazzari said. “But the thing is, during a renovation you have to move out, live in an apartment or find someplace else, and then come back home when it’s finished.”