Why are Denver law and accounting firms expanding their office footprints in 2026?

Because office space has become a recruiting tool again, not just overhead. Several of Denver's established professional firms have expanded, upgraded, or relocated into better space this year, and the pattern isn't virtual-to-first-office. It's firms that already had offices deciding the space they had wasn't good enough to compete for talent and clients. Taft expanded 40% at Block 162. FBT Gibbons moved up an entire tower to take a full floor. If you run a professional services firm in Denver and you're still treating the office as a cost to minimize, you're reading the market backward.

I get this question from managing partners more than almost any other right now: does anyone actually need an office anymore?

The honest answer, based on what's actually happening in Denver leasing this year, is that the firms doing well are answering yes, then asking a harder follow-up question. Not whether to have an office, but whether the one they have is good enough.

The recommit pattern: three Denver firms making the move up, not out

Three deals from this year make the pattern clear, and none of them fit the story you'd expect from a soft office market.

Taft expanded 29,000 square feet at Block 162, a 40% jump that brings the firm to roughly 101,000 square feet total, adding 38 attorneys in a single year. That's not a firm shrinking its footprint to match remote work. That's a firm growing into more space because it's growing its headcount and wants that growth visible.

FBT Gibbons moved from the 27th floor to the full 49th floor at 1801 California, 22,131 square feet. That's a move up the building, not just a renewal in place. When a firm pays to move higher in its own tower, it's making a statement about what its address says to clients and recruits.

Cooper Carry made the opposite-scale version of the same move: relocating from Boulder into downtown Denver, 5,700 square feet at 1900 Lawrence. Smaller footprint, better location. The firm didn't need more space. It needed the right space.

Three different firm sizes, three different moves, one shared logic: each firm chose better over bigger or cheaper. None of them chose to shrink into virtual-only or hybrid-light operations. They chose to spend more on a smaller number of better square feet.

Why office space is becoming a recruiting tool again

Here's the structural reason this is happening now, and it's not sentimental.

Professional services firms compete for the same pool of associates, staff accountants, and junior analysts that every other employer in Denver is chasing. Roughly 52% of the workforce still works in some hybrid arrangement, and about 69% of firms now track attendance in some form. In that environment, the office itself becomes part of the pitch to a candidate deciding between two offers.

A dated floor with fluorescent lighting and 1990s finishes tells a recruit something about the firm, whether the partners intend it to or not. A full floor with a real view, built out well, tells a different story. So does a downtown address a client can find easily versus a suburban office park nobody wants to drive to for a closing.

This is also a client-experience decision, not just a recruiting one. Clients notice the space they're brought into for a deal signing or a board presentation. For firms competing on relationships as much as on rates, that's not a small thing.

None of this means office demand is uniformly up. It means the demand that exists is concentrated in better space. If you're benchmarking your own firm's move-up decision against submarket vacancy and rent, the tightest, most competitive submarkets are exactly where this recommit trend is concentrated. Cherry Creek North is running near 2% vacancy for a reason.

What this means if you're a small or mid-size professional firm sizing your own move

Most of the conversation about Denver office demand focuses on large occupiers. But the Cooper Carry deal is the more instructive one for the majority of professional firms in this market: small, established, 5,000 to 10,000 square feet, deciding whether the current lease still fits.

A few things I'd tell a partner in that position:

• Don't confuse a shrinking budget with a shrinking need for quality. You can often move to a smaller footprint in a better building for close to the same rent you're paying now in a dated one, especially given current concession levels.
• Weigh the submarket, not just the address. Downtown Denver and DTC solve different problems. One puts you closer to courts, closer to clients who work downtown, and closer to the talent pool that wants a downtown commute. The other solves cost and parking. The tradeoff is real and submarket-specific, not a universal answer.
• Size the space to who actually shows up, not to your headcount. Even firms upgrading quality are typically not upgrading total square footage per employee. Right-sizing the footprint to actual attendance still applies even when the goal is a better address, not a smaller one.

The firms making this move aren't doing it because the office is suddenly essential again in the way it was in 2015. They're doing it because in a market where clients and candidates have options, the office is now one of the few tangible signals a firm controls.

Frequently asked questions

Are law firms and accounting firms actually expanding their offices in Denver right now?

Yes, several established firms have expanded or upgraded this year. Taft grew 40% to roughly 101,000 square feet at Block 162, adding 38 attorneys. FBT Gibbons moved to a full floor higher in its building. These are recommit moves, not a broad reversal of hybrid work.

Is this a return-to-office mandate trend or something else?

It's primarily a talent and client-experience decision, not a mandate story. Firms are competing for the same recruits and clients other employers want, and the physical office has become part of how they compete, even as roughly 52% of the workforce still works some hybrid schedule.

Should a small professional services firm upgrade its office even if it's not growing?

Often yes, if the current space undercuts the firm's ability to compete for talent or impress clients. The Cooper Carry move from Boulder to a smaller, better-located downtown Denver space shows the logic applies at 5,000 to 10,000 square feet, not just at large-firm scale.

Does upgrading office quality mean paying more per square foot?

Not necessarily. Current concession levels, roughly a month of free rent per year of term and elevated TI allowances in most submarkets, mean a firm can often move into meaningfully better space for close to what it's paying now in a dated building, especially with a lease expiring within the next 12 to 24 months.

Which Denver submarkets are seeing the most professional-firm recommitment activity?

Downtown Denver and Cherry Creek, both of which offer the address and amenity profile firms are competing on. Cherry Creek North in particular is running near 2% vacancy, the tightest submarket in the metro, which reflects how concentrated this demand has become.

The firms treating their office as a recruiting asset this year are the ones landing associates and clients other firms are losing. The lease decision and the talent strategy are the same decision now.

If you're working through a lease decision in Denver, whether that's a renewal, a relocation, or a footprint question your CFO is pushing on, I'm happy to run the numbers with you. Schedule a conversation.

About Brian McCririe
Brian McCririe is Executive Managing Director of SVN | Denver Commercial and National Council Chair for Occupier Services across the SVN network. After 25 years representing tenants and investors across global markets, he now focuses on the Denver Metro area helping companies navigate leases, acquisitions, and the gap between what landlords offer and what occupiers deserve. He leads one of the metro's top tenant rep practices and writes about the deals, decisions, and market shifts that matter to corporate real estate leaders.