When historic houses go on the market, it’s a chance to take stock of — and, if we’re lucky, get a look inside — some of Denver’s best buildings.

It’s also an opportunity to recognize how the rules around architectural preservation work to keep crucial, civic structures from being razed or ruined in a time when urban development is off the rails.

That’s the case for the Holland House, one of the more interesting, if lesser-known, dwellings on the city’s list of important landmarks. The house, at 2340 S. Josephine St., is among a number of early 20th century treasures that make University Park one of Denver’s most design-rich, residential neighborhoods.

But the Holland House has its own unique charm, and a story that makes it worth protecting.

That starts with its concept and construction, dreamed up by architect Eugene Groves, who, in addition to creating important buildings across the state, had a particular fetish for concrete, which he used to make a handful of structures, including this one.

The Holland House is concrete top-to-bottom, built with precast concrete studs and beams, concrete slab floors, concrete stucco walls, and even concrete dish cabinets, all leading up to the house’s star attraction: an oval-shaped, domed roof that caps its elegant living room.

When the place was conceived back in 1933, nearly every residential building in Denver used wood for its key structural elements.

To be sure, concrete — which has been around in one form or another since the 1700s — was having a moment in those days, inspiring architects to create large-scale, urban edifices across the globe. The century’s biggest names — Frank Lloyd Wright, Antoni Gaudí, Le Corbusier, Louis Kahn among them — employed the material for office buildings, apartment complexes, libraries and houses of worship.

But Groves was part of a movement that saw concrete as an efficient resource for small, single-family homes. His ideas were wholly democratic: The material was cheap, sound and sanitary, and it was thought to be fireproof and to resist infestation, with the potential to enable every family a healthy environment for living.

Groves had a personal interest in clean living. He suffered from tuberculosis and was among the wave of people who moved to this high-altitude region believing the fresh mountain air was better for breathing.

Groves’ faith in concrete lead him to patent his construction methods and eventually form the Concreter Corporation, with the idea of producing homes on a mass scale.

He found a natural client for his ideas in Mary Holland, a Denver society figure who supported numerous community welfare efforts in her day. Holland was a divorcee who moved to Denver from Detroit in 1911, helping to establish the Craig Colony for tuberculosis patients. She organized the Colorado Child Welfare Bureau and later the Colorado Children’s Aid Society, where she served as the first executive secretary.

Holland asked her architect to create a home “that would at the end of the professional day be a haven of beauty, comfort and convenience,” as she described it in a 1938 article in Homes of the West magazine.

Groves attended to every detail of that request, designing a home with built-in cabinets and cubbies and a telephone cove for private conversations. Groves described the kitchen as a “food laboratory,” for which he built concrete counters and even precious wall cut-outs to hold salt-and-pepper shakers.

Groves’ ability to finesse concrete is visible all over the house. He used the hard material to create soft arches and angles around doors and passageways, curved ceilings and details like the fluted pilasters that greet visitors at the entry.

The collaborators’ shared interests come together in several ways at the Holland House. There’s a sunroom with a hand-painted, wood inlay pattern in the ceiling, and a “health sleeping unit” toward the back of the house, a unique feature that consists of a bright alcove, large enough to hold a single bed and surrounded by windows to let in light and air. The mini-room has built-in bookshelves and pocket doors that close to keep it warm in the winter.

They paid particular attention to the house’s connection to the outdoors. There’s a large garden with separate lounging areas and, notably, a set of concrete stairs, attached to the rear exterior wall that lead up to a rooftop deck.

Still, Groves’ most graceful accomplishment came through the signature move that defined his concrete houses: the domed ceiling that gives the main parlor space an air of luxury and simple, classically inspired refinement.

The dome has the added effect of instilling the room with excellent acoustics, which were desirable for its last occupants, Shirley and Leonard Kenneally, who have their own interesting story.

The couple was active in the Denver music scene, supporting local players and going so far as to put a recording studio in the house. Leonard was an experienced jet aviator who died when a single-engine plane he was piloting crashed in 1987 over the rural town of Coaldale.

Shirley stayed in the house, living there for a total of 43 years until she died last year. It was Shirley who, working with her neighbors, submitted the landmark designation application, which provided much of the background info for this article.

That status saves the house from potential harm, requiring a city review and approval for any efforts to significantly alter its appearance — no doubt making it less attractive to developers.

“This house sits on four lots. If it had not been designated as a landmark, it probably would have been snapped up by a developer who would have scraped it,” said Rosemary Stoffel, who lives in University Park and has emerged as a preservation activist for her neighborhood.

Pam Nunez, a real estate agent with Metro Brokers who is handling the sale for the Kenneally estate, said the Holland House, now unoccupied, will go on the market in the next few weeks. In its current incarnation, which includes a bedroom addition tucked onto the back in later years, it is 1,667 square feet above ground, plus a semi-finished, 660-square-foot basement. The lot is a considerable 15,000 square feet, forming a rare open space in the area.

The website Zillow estimates the house to be worth just over $1 million, but that doesn’t take into account its history or its unique design, which could increase its value by as much as half, or possibly more. It’s a showpiece, even if it could use a kitchen remodel and it’s not as large as the other houses on the street.

The fact that Groves was the architect adds additional cache. He designed numerous academic buildings for Colorado State University, but also quirky gems, such as the 1937 Johnson’s Corner gas station in Longmont, a local icon currently awaiting its own restoration.

Sale prices are hard to predict in Denver’s robust housing market, especially for a property where comparisons are impossible. Safe to say, it’ll go for more than the $5,500 Mary Holland spent to build it almost nine decades ago.

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