Skycastle builds dreams on a solid foundation

BOULDER — How did nineteenth-century essayist Henry David Thoreau inspire a Boulder County architect and homebuilder? With these words:

“If you’ve built your castles in the air, your work need not be lost. That’s where they were meant to be. Now, build your foundations under them.”

Scott Rodwin took Thoreau’s advice to heart when naming Skycastle Construction in 2001 as the hammer-and-nails partner of the Rodwin Architecture firm he started two years earlier — not to mention the fact that the company’s first project was on Skyway Drive.

Designing and building those castles in the air — and solidly grounding them in quality — for the often unique aesthetics of Boulder County has spurred continued growth for Rodwin’s companies. Skycastle’s 86 percent two-year growth placed it first in Flight 3 of BizWest’s Mercury 100 fastest-growing companies in the Boulder Valley, while Rodwin Architecture placed seventh in Flight 4 with 42 percent growth.

“We’re focused on this geographic region, so we know the territory very well,” Rodwin said. “We were one of the first firms in the area to do design-build; it’s faster and more cost-effective, and the design intent is protected by one consistent team from start to finish. That has led to a higher degree of satisfaction from our clients, and therefore it tends to yield repeat work and strong referrals.”

Some builders build buildings. “We design and build Teslas,” Rodwin said. “The buildings we design tend to be LEED platinum, net-zero energy, very intelligently designed buildings on the leading edge of sustainability.”

Rodwin credits vice president and general contractor Brandon David for much of his integrated design-build team’s success. “He runs the Skycastle side of things,” Rodwin said. “Brandon has 20 years of construction experience and an architectural degree. When the team is one and the same, it preserves a client’s original intention the best and can handle design opportunities we only discover in the field. That means good cost prediction and control.”

The team’s work is 40 percent commercial and 60 percent residential, he said.

On the commercial side have been everything from restaurants, offices and retail projects to religious spaces and yoga studios. In the works are a large retail flagship store on downtown Denver’s 16th Street Mall, an 8,000-square-foot commercial project in downtown Erie, and a large restaurant in a prominent Fort Collins location that Rodwin promises will create a “big splash.”

On the residential side, he said, are “high-end, extraordinary, custom green homes” — including some special projects for folks moving to Boulder for jobs at Google. “Tech professionals across the board are a pretty common client for us,” Rodwin said.

What of the future? “We want to continue to create really extraordinary projects for our clients, continue to refine our systems and improve service,” Rodwin said. “We don’t see any stop in the near future to growth in the design-construction industry in this area.”

See the list 2018 BizWest 500 – Boulder Valley Mercury 100

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