More than 6,000 champagne glasses rose in a glittering pyramid inside the Brown Palace Hotel's atrium Sunday, as roughly 800 guests packed downtown Denver's historic hotel for the 38th annual Champagne Cascade. The event sold out for the first time in five years, and a $20,000 winning bid from DraftKings chief legal officer R. Stanton Dodge secured him the honor of pouring the champagne over the top of the towering display.
The long-running holiday kickoff, as reported by the Denver Gazette, filled seven stories of hotel atrium balconies with spectators watching the cascade unfold. Brown Palace general manager Alfonso Perez-Vega said the event sold out as of Saturday, meaning about 800 guests would be in attendance Sunday. Before the pour, guests were treated to cocktails, coffee, dessert bites and brunch, along with Santa Claus photos and live jazz.
A Sellout Night With a Charitable Purpose
This year's cascade benefited the Denver Rescue Mission, with Perez-Vega saying 25% of the event's ticket sales would be donated to the organization, along with all day-of beverage sales. The hotel expected Sunday's event to surpass last year's fundraising record of $32,500, though the final total had not yet been calculated since drink sales still needed to be tallied, according to the Denver Gazette's reporting.
Denver Rescue Mission President and CEO Dennis Van Kampen gave remarks during the event and thanked attendees for helping support the organization and its mission. The Denver Rescue Mission is a faith-based organization that works to end homelessness. Perez-Vega noted a historical coincidence tying the two institutions together: the mission, he said, was founded the same year as the Brown Palace — 1892.
Even Football Took a Backseat
The Broncos-Panthers game had been broadcast inside the hotel earlier in the day, but the game was switched off once the Champagne Cascade got underway, underscoring just how central the tradition has become to the hotel's calendar. Perez-Vega said the hotel values continuing its legacy and supporting the community, a sentiment that has carried through past editions of the cascade under different charitable banners.
A Tradition With a Shifting Cast of Beneficiaries
The Champagne Cascade has rotated its charitable beneficiary over the years. A 2017 edition, also featuring a 6,000-glass pyramid and swordsmen wielding Napoleonic sabers to sever bottle necks, raised $31,750 for The Denver Post's Season to Share, an amount matched by DaVita. A later version, described as the 35th annual Champagne Cascade and featuring a two-story tower of 5,201 glasses, raised more than $32,000 for Make-A-Wish Colorado, per the Denver Gazette's earlier coverage.
This year's swordsmen once again used sabers to pop the champagne bottle necks before the cascade began, a flourish that has become a signature of the event alongside the glass pyramid itself.
Mission's Broader Shift Toward Prevention
The fundraiser arrives as the Denver Rescue Mission adjusts its approach to homelessness work elsewhere in the city. The organization recently said it decided not to bid on a new contract to operate the 48th Avenue Center, part of a broader shift toward programs designed to prevent homelessness before it starts, according to the Denver Post. The mission has said the first year of a school-based prevention program helped keep 106 families, including 211 children, in their homes.
Back at the Brown Palace, the champagne-soaked pyramid and the crowded balconies offered a different kind of statement — one built on spectacle rather than statistics, but pointed at the same cause. With ticket and beverage proceeds still being tallied, the hotel's hope was that Sunday's sellout crowd would push the long holiday tradition past its own record.
