Two blocks north of where Clear Creek cuts off downtown Golden, there’s a massive construction site teeming with ceramic scraps built up over the decades hiding in the dirt.

A shell of a new building stands on the site, meeting with the remains of an old brick wall and pillars that have been charred at their foundation with specks of glittering glass embedded into the concrete from the first kilns that made glass bottles in the former factory more than a century ago.

Earlier this month, construction workers placed the last steel beam on the top of the building, marking an important milestone in the project’s construction. Developers call it a “topping out.” 

It’s the first of several structures planned for a new district being developed by the family who founded one of the most recognizable American beers: Coors.

While the name is famous for it brews, the six-block district project named Clayworks is a tribute to another Coors venture that helped the company power through the prohibition era.

This new building will become the future headquarters of CoorsTek, the family’s 112-year-old ceramics business that’s become an industrial manufacturer for a variety of industries spanning from aerospace, semiconductors, electronics, health and auto.

As CoorsTek moved many of its manufacturing facilities to other parts of the world and the U.S., including to Grand Junction in Colorado and Arkansas, the family reconsidered what to do with the manufacturing facility where the company was founded.

“They were confronted with ‘What are we going to do with this historic property’ and decided, ‘We’re going to redevelop it and the first building’s going to be for us,’” said Dan Cohen, president of AC Development, a development company created for the project. “So this milestone’s really exciting.”

The Clayworks district — which got its name from the region’s natural clay deposits used for CoorsTek’s first ceramics and porcelain products — is set to create more than 700,000 square feet of office space, 150 hotel rooms, 500 apartments (including 10% workforce housing) and 60,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space.

It’ll also create two new streets, three new plazas and reuse several buildings in the district, receiving unanimous approval from Golden’s City Council in 2022 to move forward with the project.

Estimates for the development could cost between $750 million to $1 billion for full build out, Cohen said, though it could depend on the economy as many developments are dealing with high interest rates and growing construction costs.

The CoorsTek headquarters is the first phase and anchoring tenant of Clayworks.

It’ll be a 182,000-square-foot office four stories tall with underground parking. And it’ll be fully electric and powered by geothermal wells lying 500 feet below ground. CoorsTek will occupy the top two floors.

There’s also new surface parking being developed, which attracted criticism from the public during the site plan’s approval process.

The building is set to be completed in 2026, according to the developers. The rest of Clayworks could be fully built within eight to 10 years.

From the top floor, which will include outdoor patio space, workers at the company will be able to look over at the Coors brewery at the base of South Table Mountain and historic downtown Golden.

CoorsTek was founded in 1910 at the site of the former Colorado Glass Works Warehouse built in 1886. It went under several names such as the Herold Pottery and China Company at its founding to the Coors Porcelain Company and Coors Ceramics.

The company was renamed CoorsTek in 2000.

The company permanently stopped producing dinner and cookware products during World War II, as it became a critical supplier of technical porcelain parts for the Allies.

The new building also incorporates parts of the old factory, from a brick wall to some structural support where the factory’s first glass kilns used to be — in part to preserve the history of the site and reduce a carbon footprint.

“A great way to do that is to reuse existing building components where you can,” said Sarah Marvez, the project’s director of commercial development. “This is about 16,000 square feet, where we already had an existing structural system that we’re going to reuse. So we didn’t need new steel or new concrete for that.”

The developers are looking for other companies to fill the rest of the building, Cohen said, specifically ones who encourage their employees to come into the office and desire to be within a mixed-use and walkable environment.

“We think other folks doing really creative, interesting things will want to gather there as well,” he said.

The developers pointed to outdoor recreation companies, energy or technology companies could be good fits to occupy the space.

Golden was once a bustling mining town founded in the 1850s that later attracted farmers, coal and clay industries due to its natural environment. When Coors arrived in the late 1800s, it played a pivotal role in the city’s population growth.

It’s home to the Colorado School of Mines and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

Downtown Golden is lined with quaint historic shop buildings dating back to the Victorian era.

Now, the area is known for its proximity to the Rocky Mountains and many hiking trails.

Clayworks is aiming to become an extension of downtown Golden’s Washington Avenue and bring new amenities to the heart of the town — and new potential customers.

“A lot of the downtown businesses are disproportionately reliant on mostly summer tourism,” Cohen said. “We’re going to be able to even the year out for them by having midweek and daytime office employees, and additional residents and ultimately hotel guests.”

While the district will retain some historic elements to match downtown Golden, he added it will also bring modern, Class A buildings and workforce housing to the neighborhood where there’s a large housing demand.

Back in 2017, city planners identified the CoorsTek site as a potential “area of significant change” in a neighborhood plan and encouraged redevelopment of the area to be mixed-use and to consider expanding Downtown Golden toward Highway 58 by creating more pedestrian-friendly streets and public spaces.

When the factory was there, Marvez said the area was closed off from the rest of the city due to the loud noises and industrial atmosphere.

She pointed to Clear Creek and said the body of water was underutilized, adding that the Coors project is planning to bridge the north part of the neighborhood to the rest of downtown.

“A big part of our project is reintroducing this part of Golden back to the city,” she said, “and hopefully transitioning the center of gravity of Golden more to the north here.”