Another Colfax restaurant shutters over Memorial Day Weekend

While some of us spent this past weekend enjoying the extra day off and attending Memorial Day barbecues, the owners of The W spent the long weekend closing their two-year-old restaurant located at 5001 E. Colfax Ave. Its last day was Sunday, May 24. 

“With sincere gratitude, we’re announcing the permanent closure of The W,” the business said in a statement posted to its front door. “While we hoped for a different outcome, the challenges of today’s economic and business climate have made continuing unsustainable.”

Carrie and Ernest Wigglesworth opened The W in 2024, with the idea of bringing the family’s longtime burger tradition to Denver. Ernest’s father married into the Santilli family, who have run the Owl Cigar Store burger joint on Cañon City’s Main Street for over 80 years. 

So The W was very burger-centric, boasting a “craft burger” menu that included everything from your basic patty-cheese-bun combination to a charcuterie-style burger loaded with prosciutto, manchego cheese, gherkins, sweet peppers and mustard.

It also carved out a niche with its “scoop” fries: a wide, deep French fry much like a potato skin created for dipping, or filled with cheese, jalapeño and bacon. 

But you can’t talk about The W without a nod to its iconic — and storied — location. The building on the corner of E. Colfax and Elm St. stands out with its large windows overlooking the street and bright green tiles that are an immediate attention-getter. Unfortunately, those eye-catching tiles haven’t been of much help to the building’s many inhabitants over the years. 

Before The W, the space housed Crush Wing + Tap, which closed in 2022. Other past occupants include a bar called the Elm and and Weiss Drugs. The W tried to honor its predecessors in various ways, such as reusing the drugstore’s old milk glasses at the bar, and highlighting the former owners in a mural decorating the enclosed back patio.

That mural will now need an update to include yet another shuttered business that formally called the building home. While the closing announcement made no mention of the ongoing BRT construction taking place on Colfax, The W’s location lies squarely in the midst of it. Although the sidewalk is accessible, the stretch of Colfax where the building sits has lane closures in both directions and large holes in the pavement waiting for completion. 

The W now joins the list of Colfax closures that includes Middleman, Q House, Misfit Snack Bar, Crazy Horse Kitchen and Bar, Machete Tequila and Tacos, and Enzo’s on Colfax. Others, like Le Clare’s Patisserie, have shifted business models away from retail to wait out the project. 

“Thank you to everyone who supported us, spent time with us, and helped make The W what it was,” read the bar’s closing post on Instagram. “We will always be grateful for this community.”