Where to Find the Best Patios in Denver – Go to Arvada

It’s summer! Do you feel it…the pull to be outside as much as we can? In Denver Colorado where we have sun 300 days a year (our best-kept not-so-secret), it’s the perfect region for outdoor dining, drinking, games, markets, and events. The front range comes alive as restaurants and bars sweep off their patios, and set up their chairs, tables, corn hole, bocce ball, and stages. It’s the opening of patio season around Colorado’s front range; patios in Denver – here we come!

This is the time of year I find myself asking friends, “where can we go and sit outside?”. It’s time to head to Denver’s best patios…in Arvada. Yup – you read that right, for the best patios in Denver, I’m sending you to Arvada – a western suburb of the Denver metro area.

Okay – Arvada is technically not in Denver, it is its own municipality. The city is a part of the Denver–Aurora–Lakewood, CO Metropolitan Statistical Area, and the Front Range Urban Corridor. I was surprised to find out that it is the seventh most populous city in Colorado! But honestly, the average person would just think that it’s a part of Denver as it’s hard to determine where one ends and the other begins. Plus – it’s only 7 minutes (or a 20 min RTD ride) from downtown Denver!

Why Arvada Patios are the Best in Denver

When you look at Denver as a whole, you’ll find patios spread out around the Denver Metro area, but there is one place where you can find them concentrated, in so much abundance that it evokes an entire patio culture – Olde Town Arvada. I like to call it Patio Town Arvada

Arvada’s patios are so great because they are:

• Numerous – nearly every establishment in Olde Town has patio space in front of their business. And a few have patios in the back or rooftop patios! Breathe that fresh air everywhere you go!
• Proximity – Olde Town is cute and small. The whole area takes up about 4 square blocks. This makes patio hopping easy because everything is so close to each other. Last summer I wrote about how you can do a really fun progressive dinner in Olde Town restaurants – well – you can also do that progressive dinner on Arvada patios – hopping from one to the other for the next course!
• Pedestrian Only – The Olde Town area has been designated pedestrian-only. This is also why the restaurants and bars have so much room to spill out on the sidewalks because there are no cars or parking taking up…