Emily Griffith Technical College is set to pay $11 million for Centennial Hall, a more than 100-year-old building on the former Johnson & Wales University campus in Denver's South Park Hill neighborhood, with plans to occupy the roughly 66,000-square-foot property by October. The Denver Public Schools Board of Education unanimously approved the acquisition in April, and the deal is expected to close in October 2026.
The seller is Urban Land Conservancy, which owns about half of the 25-acre Mosaic Community Campus at 1800 Pontiac St., according to Bisnow. Emily Griffith Technical College, the public adult education and postsecondary arm of Denver Public Schools, currently operates out of a district building at 1860 Lincoln St. and also has a presence at its Osage campus at 1205 Osage St. The college plans to use its reserve fund alongside 2020 bond money allocated to the institution to complete the purchase.
Centennial Hall sits on approximately 0.73 acres and is located east of a public quad on the Mosaic Community Campus. The building will let Emily Griffith Technical College centralize its student services and administrative staff, and it's expected to host esthetician programs as well as community events such as graduations, per the same report. Sarah Heath said Centennial Hall has a similar timeline to the longevity of the college itself, and that the building will be an excellent space for learners, adding that it will serve as a hub for specific classroom-facing programs.
A Building With Deep Roots on the Park Hill Campus
Centennial Hall was originally constructed in 1886 as Treat Hall, the anchor building for Colorado Women's College, and it remains protected by a permanent historic preservation easement held by Historic Denver that safeguards its Richardsonian Romanesque exterior no matter who owns the property. The wider Park Hill campus first opened in 1909 as Colorado Women's College with just 59 students, later grew past 1,000 students, and eventually passed to the University of Denver before Johnson & Wales University bought it in 2000. Johnson & Wales operated the site for 21 years before closing its Denver campus in 2021.
Johnson & Wales renamed the structure Centennial Hall in 2014 and completed a $17 million renovation in 2015, transforming a building that had sat shuttered for three decades into a modern academic and student services center, according to Johnson & Wales University. That renovation is a key reason the building is essentially move-in ready for its next occupant. After Johnson & Wales departed, St. Elizabeth's School, an independent, intentionally inclusive K-8 school, occupied Centennial Hall starting in 2021 before permanently closing in June 2025.
From University Campus to Community Hub
Urban Land Conservancy, Denver Public Schools, and the Denver Housing Authority jointly bought the 25-acre former university campus in June 2021, and the property was officially renamed the Mosaic Community Campus in July 2022 following a six-month public engagement process, according to Urban Land Conservancy. Urban Land Conservancy holds land on the east side of the campus through a 99-year community land trust ground lease meant to keep the site permanently affordable. The campus today includes six affordable housing buildings, a coffee shop, and the Kitchen Network nonprofit food business incubator.
Nonprofit developer Archway Communities secured financing in December 2022 to convert four former Johnson & Wales dormitories on the campus into 154 affordable apartments, backed by $34 million in tax credit equity and public housing funds, per Archway Communities. Those apartments serve individuals and families earning between 30% and 60% of the area median income. The Kitchen Network, which expanded onto the campus in 2021 out of the former Culinary Arts Building, already collaborates with Emily Griffith Technical College on culinary training certifications, serving more than 150 active food business users monthly on the site.
Bigger Plans Beyond Centennial Hall
Denver School of the Arts high school will expand into three buildings on the west side of the Mosaic Community Campus, per Scott Pribble. Emily Griffith Technical College is also working with Denver Public Schools to build out a quantum space at Aspen Hall, where the college occupies a building at 18th Avenue and Pontiac Street. Renovations at Aspen Hall are expected to begin in February 2027 and finish by November of that year, with the college planning to move health sciences courses and other programs into the renovated space in January 2028.
That quantum push connects to a larger regional effort: Emily Griffith Technical College is partnering with Elevate Quantum, a Rocky Mountain tech hub awarded $41 million by the U.S. Economic Development Administration, to build a Quantum Learning Lab and establish a Quantum Technician certificate program. Elevate Quantum was federally designated in 2023 to advance quantum information technology development and workforce training across Colorado and New Mexico.
A Milestone Year for Denver's Oldest Technical College
Emily Griffith Technical College is the oldest public technical college in Colorado, founded in September 1916 by educator Emily Griffith as the Opportunity School under the motto “For All Who Wish to Learn.” The college has trained nearly two million students over its history, according to History Colorado, and the original 1926 Opportunity School building in downtown Denver received a city historic landmark designation in 2016. The college will celebrate its 110th anniversary in 2026, the same year it plans to move into Centennial Hall.
The purchase is funded in part by Denver Public Schools' voter-approved November 2020 general obligation bond measure, which provided $795 million in capital improvement funding and generated an additional $176 million thanks to favorable bond sale interest rates. Bond funds are strictly regulated under state and tax law and restricted to physical facilities and capital improvements, meaning the Centennial Hall purchase falls squarely within the voter-mandated rules governing adult and career technical education infrastructure. Emily Griffith Technical College, which is governed by the Denver Public Schools Board of Education, is treating the acquisition as a chance to bring its scattered administrative and student-facing operations under one historic roof.
