A Small Neighborhood with a Long Story
Belmar Gardens is one of those Lakewood neighborhoods that can seem modest at first glance: tree-lined residential streets, comfortable postwar homes, and an easy connection to Belmar Park and the activity around West Alameda Avenue. But behind its familiar appearance is a layered history that reaches from 19th-century farming to one of the Denver metro area’s most ambitious urban redevelopments.
The Belmar Gardens subdivision is roughly located between South Garrison Street and Carr Street, and between West Mississippi Avenue and Belmar Avenue. It was the first platted subdivision in the broader Addenbrooke-Belmar Park area, recorded in 1948. That makes the neighborhood an important bridge between Lakewood’s rural past and its modern suburban identity. ([lakewood.org](https://www.lakewood.org/files/assets/public/planning/comprehensive-planning/pdfs/community-plans/archived/addenbrookebelmarparkneighborhoodplanarchived04272015.pdf?utm_source=openai))
Today, residents may think of Belmar Gardens as a quiet pocket near Belmar Park, but the surrounding landscape once included farms, dairies, country estates, irrigation ditches, and open fields. The neighborhood’s history is easy to miss unless you know where to look.
Before Belmar Gardens: Farms and Open Country
Long before streets such as West Mississippi Avenue and Belmar Avenue were lined with homes, the area was part of a larger agricultural landscape. One of the most important early families was the Everitt family. John Edward Everitt staked a homestead claim in 1876, and the family farm eventually stretched from Garrison Street west toward Kipling Street, south of West Alameda Avenue.
The Everitt farm produced cabbage and other vegetables. After the Agricultural Ditch was constructed through the property, the operation expanded to include a dairy and processing plant. Water was essential to farming in this part of Jefferson County, and the network of ditches helped transform dry prairie into productive farmland. ([lakewood.org](https://www.lakewood.org/files/assets/public/planning/comprehensive-planning/pdfs/community-plans/archived/addenbrookebelmarparkneighborhoodplanarchived04272015.pdf?utm_source=openai))
That agricultural heritage helps explain the broad, open feeling that still characterizes portions of Belmar Park and the neighborhoods around it. Even as homes and commercial districts replaced fields, the area retained a spacious western-suburban character.
How Belmar Gardens Got Its Name
The name “Belmar” is closely tied to May Bonfils, daughter of Denver Post co-founder Frederick G. Bonfils. Beginning in the 1930s, Bonfils acquired land around what is now Kountze Lake and created a country estate known as Belmar Farms. Her mansion was completed in 1937 near the modern intersection of South Wadsworth Boulevard and West Alameda Avenue. ([lakewoodco.gov](https://www.lakewoodco.gov/Local-Government/Departments/Community-Resources/Arts-and-Culture/Heritage-Lakewood/Historic-Structures-and-Tours/Virtual-Historic-Tours?utm_source=openai))
The name Belmar is commonly understood as a combination of “Belle,” Bonfils’s mother’s name, and “May,” her own name. The estate became one of the area’s most recognizable landmarks, even though the mansion itself no longer survives. ([digital.auraria.edu](https://digital.auraria.edu/downloads/jt3c1-nyb98/AA00006399_00001.pdf?utm_source=openai))
Belmar Farms was more than a residence. Bonfils and her husband, Charles E. Stanton, raised prize-winning Suffolk sheep and Black Angus cattle. The property included barns, sheds, an auction house, a caretaker’s cottage, and landscaped grounds surrounding Kountze Lake. Deer reportedly roamed the estate, and the lake was enlarged for boating and recreation. ([lakewoodco.gov](https://www.lakewoodco.gov/Local-Government/Departments/Community-Resources/Arts-and-Culture/Heritage-Lakewood/Historic-Structures-and-Tours/Virtual-Historic-Tours?utm_source=openai))
When the Belmar Gardens subdivision was platted in 1948, its name reflected the influence and identity of this nearby estate. In a very literal sense, the neighborhood grew out of a landscape already known as Belmar.
The 1948 Subdivision and a New Residential Era
The creation of Belmar Gardens came during a major period of change across Lakewood. After World War II, families sought affordable homes outside Denver, and formerly rural areas began filling in with subdivisions. Belmar Gardens was part of that transformation.
Its streets and modest homes reflected the practical design of the era. Rather than grand houses on expansive farm parcels, the subdivision offered a more attainable form of homeownership: compact lots, approachable floor plans, and room for gardens, children, and everyday family life.
For longtime residents, this is part of the neighborhood’s enduring charm. Belmar Gardens feels established without being formal. Mature trees soften the streetscape, and many homes still reveal the postwar building traditions of Lakewood through brick exteriors, ranch-style layouts, attached garages, and broad front lawns.
The neighborhood’s location also gave residents a strong connection to both nature and commerce. Belmar Park offered open space and walking paths, while West Alameda Avenue and South Wadsworth Boulevard connected families to shopping, schools, churches, and transportation.
Landmarks That Keep the Past Visible
The most important historic landmark near Belmar Gardens is Heritage Lakewood Belmar Park. The 15-acre history park and museum preserves buildings and artifacts connected to Lakewood’s 20th-century development. Several structures associated with the former Belmar estate remain, including the caretaker’s cottage, calving barn, machinery sheds, granary, and auction house. ([lakewoodco.gov](https://www.lakewoodco.gov/Local-Government/Departments/Community-Resources/Arts-and-Culture/Heritage-Lakewood/Historic-Structures-and-Tours/Virtual-Historic-Tours?utm_source=openai))
The park also includes a 1920s interpretation of a country school, a 1948 Valentine Diner, the Peerless Gas Station, and other buildings that help tell the story of everyday life in the region. These landmarks make local history tangible. Instead of reading only about farms and early roads, visitors can walk through the spaces where people worked, learned, ate, and gathered.
Kountze Lake is another defining feature. Once part of Bonfils’s private estate, it is now a public recreational setting surrounded by paths, grassland, and wildlife habitat. It remains one of the most peaceful places in the area, especially in the early morning or late afternoon.
Although the Belmar mansion was demolished in the early 1970s, its legacy continues through the park, the neighborhood name, and the historic gates and estate features preserved or interpreted by Heritage Lakewood.
Villa Italia and the Reinvention of Belmar
The decades after Belmar Gardens was established brought another dramatic change. In 1965, Villa Italia Shopping Center opened near West Alameda Avenue and South Wadsworth Boulevard. For 35 years, the mall served as a major regional destination and became a familiar part of Lakewood life.
By the 1990s, however, Villa Italia was declining. The mall closed in 2001, and Lakewood faced a major question: what should happen to such a large and prominent site? The answer was a new mixed-use district inspired by the name and history of the former Belmar estate.
Construction began in the early 2000s, and Belmar opened in 2004 on the former mall property. The 22-block development introduced shops, restaurants, residences, offices, public spaces, and a more walkable street pattern. The city describes Belmar as a modern downtown for Lakewood, while preserving the area’s historic connection to May Bonfils and Villa Italia. ([lakewoodco.gov](https://www.lakewoodco.gov/Services/Business/Reinvestment-Authority/LRA-Activities?utm_source=openai))
For Belmar Gardens residents, this redevelopment brought a new level of convenience. A quiet residential neighborhood now sits close to outdoor concerts, restaurants, a library, the Lakewood Cultural Center, neighborhood events, and everyday shopping.
Belmar Gardens Today
Belmar Gardens has evolved without losing its sense of place. The farms are gone, the Bonfils mansion has disappeared, and Villa Italia survives only in photographs and memories. Yet the neighborhood still reflects each chapter of its history.
Its homes speak to the postwar suburban era. Belmar Park preserves the open land and historic buildings that came before. Belmar’s modern streets and storefronts represent Lakewood’s effort to create a civic center for the future. Together, these pieces make the area feel less like a single development than a living timeline.
What makes Belmar Gardens special is that its history is not sealed away in a distant museum. It is present in the names of streets, the paths around Kountze Lake, the mature trees along neighborhood blocks, and the buildings preserved at Heritage Lakewood. A walk from Belmar Gardens to the park can pass through more than a century of Lakewood history.
That continuity is the neighborhood’s greatest heritage: a place where farmland became a subdivision, an estate became a park, a mall became a downtown, and generations of residents continued to make the area their own.