Owl Cigar Mural on Crystal Palace demolished last week
Brick and foundation to be preserved for a smaller recreation on the new building at a later date
River Stingray/The Aspen Times
The Owl Cigar Mural on the west wall of the historic Crystal Palace Building in downtown Aspen was demolished last week.
The building was built in 1891 as a wholesale produce house, operating as a place where goods were traded at wholesale prices throughout the early 1900s. One of the goods sold in the building, according to Aspen Historical Society, was the White Owl Cigar, the inspiration for the advertisement painted on the exterior.
Over the years, the building changed hands and purposes multiple times. The building eventually received a historical designation in 1981, as did the wall, separately. The planned development of the Crystal Palace began in 2017 but was beset with delays.
The wall became the subject of a preservation battle between Mark Hunt — the owner of the building by way of his development firm, M Development — and individuals who believed the mural to be a piece of history in need of preservation, namely members of the Historic Preservation Commission and other members of the public. Ultimately, however, the HPC decided to allow Hunt to proceed without a full preservation of the wall.
In a 4-3 split decision in October 2024, the HPC commissioners gave Hunt the go-ahead to demolish and relocate the mural using salvaged brick from the demolition. This followed a presentation from representatives from BendonAdams, a planning firm representing the building, to the HPC in October 2024 about difficulties they were having with preserving the wall, asking for an amendment to their preservation agreement.
“The updated proposal requested the relocation of the mural to the center of the wall,” Historic Preservation Officer Gillian White said in an email. “Which included the disposal of the painted brick and the repainting of the mural on previously unpainted brick in its new location, albeit at a smaller scale.”
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BendonAdams representatives argued at the time that the wall was not structurally sound. That, in conjunction with the wall being considered an environmental hazard due to lead paint in the mural and the historicity of the building getting called into question due to new materials found in the wall that suggested the building had been restored substantially various times as the building changed hands, led to the HPC split decision.
The final board decision allowed a downsizing re-creation of the mural in a more central location of the west wall. The demolition last week represents the first step toward that goal.
“The developer has dismantled, cleaned, and stored these historic bricks until it is time to rebuild the mural,” White said. “The developer has also salvaged some of the foundation stone to be reused with the new building.”
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