As the West’s largest wholesaler of barbershop and hair-salon products, the Buerger Brothers Supply Company excelled in the beauty business—and the firm’s Denver headquarters may have been the most beautiful thing about it. Built in 1930 at 1732 Champa Street, two doors down from the resplendent Denver Chamber of Commerce, it was one of Colorado’s first and finest Art Deco buildings, a stylishly manicured ensemble of glazed tile, wrought iron, and plate glass.

A forty-two-year-old company with operations in eleven states, Buerger Brothers sold everything from scissors and face creams to barbershop poles and shoeshine stands. Furnishings and fixtures occupied the spacious ground-floor showroom, with accessories displayed on the mezzanine and business offices taking up the third and fourth stories. When the company expanded into the neighboring Denver Fire Clay Building in 1937, it gave the property (built in 1892) a full Art Deco makeover, complete with a new coif of beveled terra cotta. The Buergers’ two structures, with the radiant Chamber of Commerce building alongside, graced Champa Street like three fashion models lining the runway.

The Chamber moved in 1950, and Buerger Brothers departed in 1972. Over time the properties grew shaggy with age, enduring fires and periods of vacancy. But in the 1990s all three received complete face-lifts, with new storefronts installed at street level and residential lofts on the upper floors. The result is one of the loveliest blocks in downtown Denver—a trio of old ladies that have become more beautiful with age.