Construction of the exterior shell of the Stanley Film Center in Estes Park is expected to wrap in December and the facility — a horror movie museum and events space — is expected to open at Estes Park’s iconic Stanley Hotel in early 2028.
“We’ll be fully closed in by Christmas,” John Cullen said Thursday, and then work will shift interior buildouts.
Cullen, whose Grand Heritage Hotel Group owned the 117-year-old, 140-room hotel for 30 years before selling it last year to the public-private partnership that’s overseeing the film center development, provided the Colorado Economic Development Commission with an update on the project this week.
“To be three and a half months ahead of schedule and on budget in any construction project — I don’t think there are a whole lot of people in Colorado who can say that right now,” Cullen said.
In a complex transaction, the Stanley Hotel property was purchased last year by the Stanley Partnership for Art, Culture and Education LLC (SPACE), a public-private partnership among the Colorado Educational and Cultural Facilities Authority (CECFA), private bond investors, Cullen and new manager Sage Hospitality Group.
“It was a long and circuitous route to get here, but you’re moving fast now and that’s impressive,” EDC chairman Chris Franz said.
Equipment and workers are spread across much of the Stanley campus as construction continues apace.
“We are at peak construction disruption right now, and unfortunately that’s overlapping with peak tourist season,” Mark Heller, CECFA executive director and SPACE chief administrative officer, told the EDC. “But we’re going to get through it. Once we’re all closed in by the end of the year, the guest experience will be as it used to be.”
Besides continuing the hotel’s current operations, a nearly $400 million bond offering that facilitated SPACE’s takeover of the hotel is funding a 65-room expansion of the two historic lodging buildings and a new 65,000-square-foot event center including a 1,000-seat performance venue and a horror film museum curated by Blumhouse Productions LLC, featuring new exhibits approximately every other month.
Blumhouse, the production company behind horror films and franchises such as “Get Out,” “Five Nights at Freddy’s,” “The Purge” and “Paranormal Activity,” will serve as the Stanley Film Center’s exclusive exhibit curator.
Live Nation Entertainment Inc. has signed on to organize concerts at the film center, Cullen said, and production studio Lionsgate Films is sniffing around.
“We will (have) a major announcement with ‘Ghost Hunters’ here shortly,” he said. While Cullen didn’t provide much detail on what the Lionsgate-produced paranormal reality show will be doing at the Stanley, he said that a Lionsgate contract could mean “probably a recurring $1 million a year in revenue to the hotel.”
In 2024, the Sundance Institute debuted its Directors Lab program at the Stanley, marking the first time the event was outside the Sundance Resort in Utah. While Boulder gears up to host the Sundance Film Festival for at least a decade starting in January, Cullen said that the Directors Lab is likely heading back west.
“It was a difficult Directors Lab” held this year amid the construction at the Stanley, he said.
“Last year, we could call for quiet on the set. This year it was a dance with construction interrupting” filming schedules, Cullen said. “… I hear that Sundance is trying to move (the Directors Lab) back to its Utah location. Boulder got the festival but the Directors Lab is going back to the Sundance Resort. I’m OK with that. Putting on my Stanley hat, we make more money serving our customers than we do with Sundance. Putting on my Colorado hat, gee, I’d love to keep them here. But, hey, we won the festival.”
