Page 40 —
COLORADO REAL ESTATE JOURNAL
— September 16-October 6, 2015
Construction, Design & Engineering News
by Jennifer Hayes
The much-anticipated Breck-
enridge Brewery is complete – a
$35 million campus that required
highly detailed coordination to put
the project on tap.
The 12-acre campus along the
South Platte River in Littleton
comprises three buildings and
provides much-needed space for
Colorado’s fifth-largest brewer.
Coburn designed the campus,
which was built by Hyder Con-
struction and for which RMH
Group served as the project’s
mechanical and electrical engineer.
Additional project members
included Krones, the process engi-
neer, KL&A, the structural engi-
neer, and CVL Consultants, the
civil engineer.
The destination brewery
includes a 21,000-square-foot Brew
House, where the beer is brewed,
a 50,000-sf production building
that is home to the fermentation
tanks, packaging, bottling, can-
ning and dry and cold storage,
and The Farm House Restaurant,
a 9,200-sf, 300-seat restaurant, all of
whichwere designed to look like a
farmstead.
“The site allowed us to spread
uses into three buildings rather
than a single structure,” explained
Principal Peter Weber, AIA, LEED
AP, of Coburn. “The Brew House
and production buildings are
reminiscent of barns you might
find around Colorado while the
restaurant is in a smaller building
designed to be like a farmhouse.
The buildings were placed to take
advantage of the site along the
Platte River with the restaurant
porches opening up onto a beer
garden and lawn facing the river
and the mountains to the west.”
And bringing it all together
required highly comprehensive
organization, according to the
project’s partners.
“Few construction projects this
year garnered more excitement
from the general public than the
opening of Breckenridge Brew-
ery’s Littleton campus,” explained
Hyder Construction, adding the
project was designed as a des-
tination brewery and already
is attracting locals and out-of-
towners alike. “With such a pub-
lic focus on one project, what is
truly incredible are the challenges
the team successfully overcame
to deliver such a dynamic proj-
ect. The project team seamlessly
integrated work on three different
building types, overcame theWest
Coast labor strike, coordinated
brewery equipment from Germa-
ny arriving in one shipment of
40 containers, safely installed this
very expensive equipment and
mediated water during one of the
wettest construction seasons on
record on a 12-acre site adjacent to
the Platte River.”
“From a design standpoint,
the project was extremely com-
plicated because it involved a
multibuilding brewery and res-
taurant complex with ambi-
tious performance/safety/sus-
tainability goals and many stake-
holders and design team partners.
Even with these inherent com-
plexities, RMHwas able to design
systems that met all functional
parameters while significantly
reducing energy and water con-
sumption andpreserving building
aesthetics, addedAnthonyA. Lott,
PE, PMP, LEED AP BD+C, chief
engineer for industrial projects at
RMH.
Coordination included work-
ing to impact the brew vessels as
minimally as possible by installing
them after the structural steel and
consequently dropping them in
through the open roofwith a crane
much like threading a needle. The
teamworked together to schedule
the deliveries of each vessel, to
constantly monitor the installation
crew to ensure the vessels were
installed properly and to train
crews working after installation
to keep the tanks in pristine con-
dition. However, the West Coast
labor strike delayed the delivery
of some of the equipment, forcing
the team to re-sequence the work
to avoid impacting the schedule.
The project team also endured
workingwith three building types
– metal building, stick frame and
structural steel – and an owner’s
timeline that forced construction
to start before design was com-
pleted in order for the owner to be
out of its original brewing facility
and into thenewonewithina strict
timeline.
s
James Ray Spahn
The 12-acre campus along the South Platte River in Littleton comprises three buildings, including a 50,000-square-foot production building and 21,000-sf brewing facility.
James Ray Spahn
The Farm House Restaurant totals 9,200 square feet and seats 300.
James Ray Spahn
Coordination of the project included installation of the brew vessels after the structural steel by dropping them
through the open roof with a crane.
