In a sign of optimism for Denver’s struggling downtown, two architecture firms announced this week they moved into their new offices within the city center.

Gresham Smith, a Nashville company specializing in architecture, engineering, design and consulting, announced Monday it moved into its new Denver base inside Park Central tower at 1515 Arapahoe Street. The second architecture firm, Montana-based Cushing Terrell, opened its office at the Atrium Campus at 1700 Broadway.

Both companies said they wanted to open in downtown as a commitment to revitalizing the area that saw office vacancies soar higher than 30% after the pandemic.

Downtown Denver has more than 9 million square feet of vacant office space in the first quarter of the year, according to commercial real estate firm CBRE.

Gresham Smith had a presence in the city for 15 years and officially expanded with its own office in 2023.

The company’s employees have been in a temporary space while its 8,000-square-foot downtown office was under construction. The company moved into the 16-story tower Park Central, which recently went under a $10 million renovation in 2020 that added bike storage, a gym and lounge areas for office building workers.

The renovations were a big reason why the company was attracted to the building, Gresham Smith’s Chief Strategy Officer Randy Gibson told the Denver Gazette.

Their office also is an open environment similar to co-working offices, where it’s designed to be a place workers can collaborate and socialize. The office was molded to cater to the rising trend of hybrid work that arose out of the pandemic.

The Nashville firm — with 26 offices across the country — prefers having a footprint in the urban core to be closer to clients and attract design professionals who typically prefer downtown environments, Gibson said. And Denver is no different.

Part of being in downtown Denver now is having closer access to some of the revitalization projects, he said.

The architecture firm specializes in airport construction, healthcare facilities, mixed-use developments and cultural or civic projects — the latter two being most prevalent in a downtown.

Gibson said the company believes the Denver metro area will continue being an attractive place people want to move and expand their businesses in and wants to invest in it.

“While downtown Denver right now is struggling a bit,” Gibson said, “we’re betting on the long term future.”

Cushing Terrell wanted to place its roots in Upper Downtown with a nearly 7,000-square-foot office.

The company said in a statement it’s “dedicated to reoccupying and revitalizing Denver’s downtown.”

Its Denver base is also an open air concept to meet the needs of hybrid workers. It has no private offices to represent the “non-hierarchical nature” of the company. It does have private booths for phone calls and a wellness room for new mothers or those needing alone time.

The space isn’t just about providing an office for its workers, but committing itself to downtown as well, its announcement said.

“This is a really important move for us,” said the company’s Denver Director Laura Dougherty in a statement. “They have created not only a visually and functionally beautiful space, but one that reflects how deeply we care about the Denver community and all the defining characteristics that make it special.”