Aurora homes have a habit of fading into the background. We think of suburban homes as bedrooms attached to garages: when work is over, we open the doors, go to bed and go back to work the next day. Yet, as more and more homes in Aurora are proving, there’s style out here in the ‘burbs. Where once was a void of flavor is a bevy of interior spice. New home builders are capitalizing on the trends that are both functional and fantastic. Broad, open spaces that pose design challenges are filled with rewards from homeowners. From the middle of the city to the eastern edges and all the way to the southern tips, we explored the places and spaces people want to be in the city. And what we found is anything but ordinary.
The road to the eastern fringes of Aurora is speckled with remnants of a nearly forgotten way of life and a quickly fading time. Route 6 separates stables, farmhouses and mud-filled pens from stoic, guarded Buckley Air Force Base, both sides of the byway acting as reminders of the military and agrarian lifestyles that for decades defined inhabitants of this city. But, with each passing mile, those sleepy, stalwart structures soon give way to the new reality that is the suburbia of the New Eastern Plains. The 21st century’s take on Lyndon B. Johnson’s Great Society, Aurora’s peripheries are now riddled with these microcosmic locales, D.R. Horton’s Traditions development being the paradigm of this swiftly expanding phenomenon.
Ideal for young families looking to foster an upbringing removed from the wired affect of the city, the newly constructed dozen-and-a-half homes of Traditions offer a tranquil way of living in a private setting. With neatly trimmed lawns, three-car garages, and an average of 2,000 square feet of living space, these homes are the pipe dream of many a cramped Denverite, vexed with yet another day of scouring the block for a parking spot.
The Prairie model, which is the priciest in the development at nearly $400,000, sports one floor of living space with a wide-open footprint. Two bedrooms hang off of the mixed living room/kitchen area, which boasts vaulted ceilings, slab granite counter tops and all stainless steel appliances. Outside features an impressively large covered patio ripe for neighborly soirees and a fenced-in patch of sod with plenty of room for modest yard games or a mid-sized dog to scamper. Beneath the furnished floor lies an expansive unfinished basement that could easily be transformed into a third bedroom or increased rec space.
A pay grade below the Prairie is the two-story Frontier, which is slightly less open, but more family-friendly with three bedrooms on the second floor and a study on the first. Lacking the robust entryway and “Honey I’m Home” feel that was a must-have for the homebuyers of 20 years ago, the front door immediately opens to a modest living room/dining area, and an L-shaped floor plan that twists into a kitchen that offers the same, modern features of the Prairie. Just beyond the kitchen is an outdoor area that mirrors that of its companion model, though with slightly less patio space. The touchstone of the Frontier is the multi-portal master bedroom, which sports a day-bed entryway, roomy Jacuzzi-equipped master bath and cavernous walk-in closet.
Although E-470 is just a hop down the road, accessibility is certainly not a top selling point for any model in Traditions, as the neighborhood is part of the last cluster of civilization before the end of the inhabitable world, better known as the Colorado/Kansas border. There is certainly no lack of amenities within the development, however, as HOA fees of $72.50 a month grant you access to a fully tricked-out recreation center and community pool. If you’re looking for a private, family-friendly suburban experience with minimal required upkeep, Traditions fits the bill.
— Quincy Snowdon
Waterfront living is not generally why people move to Colorado. But for homeowners in southeast Aurora, the city’s award-winning reservoir is part of their backyard.
The Newport is a nearly 3,000-square foot property that looks like a typical New-England-style home from the entrance. But as you walk inside, you find an open-concept living space that leads to an expansive deck out back — much like the raised wraparound decks you see in beach neighborhoods like the Outer Banks in North Carolina.
The Newport’s stone-pillared deck —which is roomy enough for an entire patio furniture set and then some — provides access to the backyard below as well as the garden-level basement. “The terrain is hilly, so it affords some pretty cool basement options.” explains Matt McNeil, a real estate agent with Capital Pacific Homes, the company that owns the subdivision. “With Southshore, it’s about taking off at the Aurora Reservoir.”
The Newport is part of the Cove at Southshore community, where homes border eight miles of hiking and biking trails along the reservoir, they also offer residents facilities like a boathouse, replete with a paddleboat and Huck Finn-style fishing dock, as well as a lighthouse-themed recreation center with a saltwater pool and fitness equipment.
The home’s garage is a three-car tandem design that allows for plenty of canoe, kayak and lake-wear storage, naturally.
The kitchen has ample storage space as well, with ceiling-to-floor maple concealed-hinge cabinets. It’s roomy enough for hosting and cooking, with slab granite countertops and a gas cooktop stove with a double oven. It also provides intimate spaces amidst the open design with a long granite island at the kitchen’s center. Hand-scraped dark natural hardwood floors are used throughout the kitchen and also lead into the living room through an informal, open-floor concept.
One of the most popular features of the Newport is the open room design, McNeil says. “The family room is connected to the kitchen and eating area. There’s no formal living room,” he explains. He says homes like The Newport draw mostly families and active empty nesters. Homes like this one sell in the mid to high $400,000 range, making them significantly more affordable than comparable new homes in the metro area closer to the mountains.
The neighborhood is a few blocks from Fox Ridge Middle School and Cherokee Trail High campus. And it’s a short drive to E-470 and the ever-growing Southlands shopping center.
The upstairs consists of two standard bedrooms, and a large master bedroom. The master bedroom includes coffered ceilings and opens onto a five-piece bathroom with two sinks, and a separate shower and bathtub lined with pristine ceramic tile. The perfect place to take in sweeping views of untouched rolling hills that still exist in the metro area, if you’re willing go just a little farther east.
— Rachel Sapin
Bright red walls and sandstone exteriors loom over what once was Buckingham Square Mall. The new Viridian at the Gardens on Havana has turned what was once a floundering shopping mall into a teeming new luxury housing development whose sleek modern designs wipe away what you thought you knew about apartments in Aurora.
And all that happens before you even hit the threshold of one of the units.
There, inside the more than 200 homes, you find single-slab granite counter tops, gooseneck sink faucets, bamboo-ish floors and brushed-chrome track lighting that makes it clear your initial assumptions were correct. This is luxury living, and it’s all smack in the middle of the city, just a short walk from the bustling Gardens on Havana shopping district and a short ride to the booming Anschutz Medical Campus.
New residential property on the site of the old Buckingham mall has been the goal of city leaders and developers since Buckingham met the wrecking ball in 2007, but the project started off slow. Initial plans for residential property on the second floor of the retail spaces were scrapped when the economy tanked, and the development morphed into what is today Viridian. The property sits just east of Gardens, and when build out is complete, it will include 223 units spread among nine different buildings. The units vary wildly, from town homes with attached garages to one-bedroom units overlooking the pool and patio space.
As you walk into the Flatirons model — the biggest of three, one-bedroom options at 806 square feet — you’re greeted immediately by a kitchen larger than in many single-family homes, and a living room bathed in sunlight from the picture window. The track lights on the ceiling and dangling globe lights over the kitchen island fill in the few spaces the natural light won’t hit.
The kitchen — which is adorned with brushed-chrome cabinet and drawer handles and a white tile back splash -— boasts wood floors that transition smoothly into lush carpet in the living room and bedroom, giving the main living space the feel of a much larger great room.
In the bedroom, another massive window spills light onto a wall painted a deep shade of granite and a walk-in closet offers ample space for any wardrobe.
The only real problem is deciding between the interior luxury and the abundance of opportunities that lay just a short walk away. Rents start at $1,100 a month.
— Brandon Johansson