E
li Cox, owner of the barstools at My Boy Tony, has added a new asset to his portfolio: the ground they sit on. He and business partner Mark Hansen purchased the real estate for their bar at 4280 Tennyson St. last week for $1.6 million.

    The building, which was previously home to BookBar, a part bookstore and part bar, has an outdoor patio and a single apartment upstairs. Cox said no immediate changes are planned, and he wants to keep the property as something good for the community.

    Cox and Hansen took out a $1.2 million, 25-year loan with a variable interest rate from Alpine Bank to finance the purchase. The building was sold by Nicole Sullivan, who operated BookBar in the space for about a decade before closing in early 2023.

    Sullivan bought the building for $685,000 in September 2012 and never listed it for sale. She chose Cox and Hansen because they had expressed interest in buying the property if she ever decided to sell. "I would have never sold it to a developer," Sullivan said. "I would be completely heartbroken if it were ever scraped."

    Sullivan is preparing to move out of state, but still owns several other properties in Denver, including her remaining bookstore and a building that houses her nonprofit, BookGive.

    For Cox, this purchase is another feather in his Tennyson real estate cap. He founded clothing store Berkeley Supply in 2012 and has been involved in several other ventures on the street. "Without Tennyson Street, I would have nothing," he said.