Scorpio Palace, the creation of Lauren Zwicky and Michael Stone, invites visitors to experience community-focused hypnotic art and music while keeping alive the spirit of DIY creative incubator Rhinoceropolis.
When local film artist Kim Shively alerted Lauren Zwicky that the lease was up for the beloved DIY warehouse art party space Rhinoceropolis, Zwicky and her partner, Michael Stone, spotted a unique opportunity. Sharing sensibilities for electronic music-minded entrepreneurship—Zwicky is a longtime Denver-based DJ and licensed cosmetologist, and Stone is a graphic designer and audio/visual artist and consultant—they opened Scorpio Palace in December 2021.
Half salon, half community art-film-music venue, Scorpio Palace knows it cannot replicate Rhino, so, with a respectful nod to the cherished past, it takes Rhino’s old location at 3553 Brighton Boulevard into a familiar but different future.
Before an eloquent friend deemed Zwicky the “death doula” of Rhino, Zwicky witnessed Rhino’s birth, landing her first DJ gig there thirteen years ago. At that time, intermittently spanning the 2000s and 2010s, Rhino was a place to celebrate art and music in a pre-gentrified, pre-RiNo Denver. (The neighborhood branders responsible for coining RiNo, the River North Arts District, claim creative coincidence in closeness to the name of its Rhino predecessor.)
Nationally recognized bands such as (pre-class traitor) Grimes, Future Islands, and Ponytail held small, intimate shows at Rhino alongside local musicians and music festivals, including Titwrench, which triumphed under-represented, femme-presenting musicians. Local artists made Rhino’s walls their canvas while also curating formal exhibitions. Some noteworthy local artists and musicians (who only scratch the surface of the talent percolating in Rhino) include Stephan Herrera, Kathryn Taylor, Madeline Johnston, Milton Melvin Croissant III, Warren Bedell, Thomas Scharfenberg, Samuel Mata, and Colin Ward.
After thirty-six people died in the 2016 Ghost Ship fire in Oakland, California, a similar creative warehouse space in which several unhoused artists resided, the city of Denver, like other nationwide municipal entities, cracked down on building code violations. The fire department—discovering illegal residents at Rhino, among other infractions—shut down the venue. As much as the community tried to save the space, holding fundraisers that provided enough money to install a water fountain and satisfy other city building code citations (which indeed allowed Rhino to reopen for a while), Rhino found it difficult to financially maintain itself as a non-residential venue. Facing an ever-elongating list of repairs in conjunction with rent inflation, it ultimately collapsed.
Scorpio Palace recalls the spirit of Rhino by offering an “incubation space” for local creatives. Plus, as Stone observes, they couldn’t let Rhino become a kava bar, as one nearsighted developer proposed.
Walking into Scorpio Palace’s front entrance, visitors first encounter Zwicky’s stylish salon space with plants, abstract paintings by local artist Matt Tarro, and a glittering disco ball wall. If you find Zwicky on Instagram, you’ll discover that she is quite the artist herself with an adventurous clientele seeking vibrant, fantasy-colored hair, edgy mullets, statement piece rattails, and trendy shags.
Moreover, with clients who are DJs, artists, and musicians, Zwicky doesn’t actively recruit people to perform and exhibit in the back room of Scorpio Palace, where folks can find a non-alcoholic bar and a chill “party” lounge, catering to low-key, ambient events. Over a decade older than their original raver selves, Zwicky and Stone are more attuned to a “stable, safe, and comfortable” scene now. “Our long-term plan is a raver retirement center,” Stone half-jokes.
None of these things indicate Scorpio Palace is anti-fun, though. And it’s certainly not anti-art. One of the first events was a screening of James Bidgood’s 1971 dreamily surreal, erotic film masterpiece Pink Narcissus, accompanied by a live score by John Moletress (aka Kraftwitch).
They’ve also hosted Denver Dijerati (a collective that exhibits digital art and animation), Red Pig Flower (DJ and artist), drag queen and king shows, markets featuring local artists and small vendors, and “deep listening sessions,” where the venue’s hi-fi sound system emphasizes a sonic—as opposed to dancey and social—experience. Partnering with Piper Rose, Scorpio Palace re-launched their popular fitness project, “Werk Out Palace.” Additionally, Jessalyn Lange of Morningstar Soulwork provides “constellation therapy,” such as new and full moon rituals.
Astrological affinities are, of course, referenced in the name Scorpio Palace. During the 2020 COVID-19 shutdowns in Colorado, Zwicky and Stone found themselves in a Scorpio-laden isolation bubble as both of them, as well as their roommate at the time, are Scorpios. Referring to themselves as “Scorpio Palace” for the live, virtual DJ-party events they held online, they kept the name once they obtained a physical location for their festivities.
Yet, Zwicky and Stone know that their days are numbered in this neighborhood as they nodded to the construction cranes surrounding another new high-rise visible from their front window. While they don’t find their vision and efforts futile, they acknowledge that Scorpio Palace’s long-term survival might not be in RiNo/Rhino.
Nevertheless, Scorpio Palace provides a positive community-art space and promotes good, mystical vibes since Zwicky and Stone know, as Zwicky puts it, “the bad magic [of] reviving a corpse.” So don’t come to Scorpio Palace expecting to find the Rhino reincarnate. But do come with expectations for some much-needed communal healing among local artistic visionaries after a collective rough start to the first few decades of the new millennium.
