The Art of the Welcome Drink
At Lady Jane, the cocktails are exceptional, and the hospitality is everything.
Stuart Weaver didn’t set out to run one of the most celebrated cocktail bars in the country. He set out to create a room where people feel genuinely seen. The fact that Lady Jane, his LoHi neighborhood bar, has since earned a James Beard Award semifinalist nod for Outstanding Bar and landed on the Tales of the Cocktail Spirited Awards’ U.S. West Regional Top 10 is, in many ways, a byproduct of that simpler ambition.
“Hospitality should remove barriers, not create them,” Stuart says. It’s a philosophy that shapes everything at Lady Jane, from the way bartenders guide guests toward the right drink to the bar’s unapologetic rooting in queer culture and community. Stuart has long been drawn to the idea of the “third place,” those spaces outside home and work where real human connection happens. Lady Jane, he believes, is one of them.
The cocktails don’t hurt either. Technique-driven and thoughtful, they manage to feel creative without ever feeling exclusionary. Stuart’s team spends serious time experimenting with ingredients and flavor combinations behind the scenes, but the finished drink always serves the guest first. “We don’t care whether you’ve heard of every ingredient on the menu,” he says. “We care that you’re drinking something you love.”
That same ease translates beautifully outside the bar’s four walls, as our recent backyard shoot made clear. With Denver’s summer fully in bloom, Stuart brought Lady Jane’s approach to a poolside afternoon, crafting cocktails that felt at once polished and effortless, exactly the kind of drinks that make a warm evening feel like a proper occasion without making anyone work too hard for it. Good cocktails, it turns out, travel well.
Stuart joined Lady Jane in 2019, just before the pandemic forced the bar, like so many others, to reimagine itself. What emerged from that period was sharper and more self-assured. “Over the years, Lady Jane has simply become more comfortable in its own walls,” he says. The accolades followed naturally.
Still, ask Stuart what makes Lady Jane worth a visit, and he’ll tell you the only honest answer is to come see for yourself. Which, given everything the bar has built, feels less like deflection and more like an open invitation. One worth accepting.
2026 James Beard Awards: Outstanding Bar Semifinalist
“Being recognized felt like validation of years of hard work, consistency, and dedication from an incredibly talented team. Everyone here pours so much of themselves into this bar, and seeing that effort honored on a national level was incredibly rewarding.” — Stuart Weaver, partner and general manager, Lady Jane
The Art of the Summer Scoop
High Point Creamery knows how to serve the good stuff.
Erika Thomas grows mint in her kitchen, harvests it by hand, and steeps it overnight in Colorado cream before straining it like a tea. For the chocolate in her mint chocolate bark flavor, she starts with Belgian milk chocolate and shaves it by hand into delicate pieces thin enough to melt at the same rate as the ice cream. It’s more work than anyone would notice, and that’s precisely the point.
Erika is the founder of High Point Creamery, one of Denver’s most beloved local institutions, and the extra effort is baked into everything she makes. Her path here was circuitous: actress in New York, then unexpected caretaker of her family’s car dealership in Ohio after her father passed away, then home cook, then entrepreneur. The turning point came with a flavor called basil with blackberry swirl. “It was this beautiful balance of earth and sweet, and I had never heard of the combination before,” she says. “That was the first time I thought, ‘okay, maybe I actually have something here.’” It wasn’t confidence the business would succeed. It was confidence that her flavors were entirely her own.
That instinct has shaped High Point from the beginning. Flavor development is collaborative now, with a full team drawing inspiration from food culture, seasonal ingredients, and the occasional happy accident. A surplus of egg whites once led to egg two ways, a lemon ice cream topped with shaved cured egg yolk and meringue. This summer brings pink mirage, riffing on the dirty soda trend. The throughline is always the same: take something familiar and ask what it could become.
The technical side matters just as much as the creative one. Take lavender lemonade sorbet, a flavor that sounds simple and isn’t. “Too much lavender and suddenly you’re eating soap, and nobody wants that,” Erika says. Paired with lemonade to keep it bright and seasonal, it’s become one of those flavors customers ask for year after year.
Getting there required as much precision as imagination, balancing sweetness, texture, and scoopability until everything clicked.
Colorado is woven into the process at every level. High Point’s proprietary ice cream mix is made by Royal Crest Dairy using Erika’s own recipe, built on local cream. From there, her team makes every sauce, candy, brittle, and inclusion from scratch. “I think people sometimes assume great ice cream starts with the mix,” she says. “But really it’s the combination of exceptional dairy and all the little details that come afterward.”
That philosophy extends to the people behind the counter as much as the product in the case. Some team members have been with High Point for years, growing into leadership roles alongside the business itself. “If our employees are happy, our customers feel it,” Erika says. For her, the ice cream gets customers in the door. The people are what keep them coming back.
At the recent backyard shoot, Erika brought that same spirit poolside, scooping High Point flavors into a golden afternoon that felt made for the occasion. Like the cocktails being crafted a few feet away, her work carries the signature of someone who has thought seriously about pleasure and made it look effortless.
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