Other sights in Miami
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Casa Elián
The surreal house of Elián Gonzales, the subject of one of the most bitter international custody battles of the 1990s, is a shrine, time capsule and exercise in public iconography. Since 2001, the house has been a temple of anti-Castro, Cuban-exile symbology. The little property is scattered with homages to Jesus, US flags and images of Elián himself, who is all but explicitly labeled a little saint of his people. Elián’s great-uncle Delfin bought the house in late 2000, then froze time inside: Elian’s clothes hang in the closet, the inner tube that saved his life at sea hangs on the wall, and his Spiderman pajamas are laid out on the bed. And then there’s the life-sized…
reviewed
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Jewish Museum of Florida
Housed in a 1936 Orthodox synagogue that served Miami’s first congregation, this small museum chronicles the rather big contribution Jews have made to the state of Florida, especially this corner. After all, while Cubans made Miami, Jews made Miami Beach, both physically (in a developer’s sense) and culturally (in an ‘anyone is welcome’ attitude). Yet there were times when Jews were barred from the American Riviera they carved out of the sand, and this museum tells that story, along with some amusing anecdotes (like seashell Purim dresses). The mainstay is Mosaic: Jewish Life in Florida, a mosaic (imagine that) of photographs and historical bric-a-brac. Also notab…
reviewed
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Bass Museum of Art
The best art museum in Miami Beach has a playfully futurist facade, a crisp interplay of lines and bright, white wall space – like an Orthodox church on a space-age Greek isle. All designed, by the way, in 1930 by Russell Pancoast (grandson of John A Collins, who lent his name to Collins Ave). The collection isn’t shabby either: permanent highlights range from 16th-century European religious works to northern European and Renaissance paintings. The Bass forms one point of the Collins Park Cultural Center triangle, which also includes the three-story Miami City Ballet and the lovingly inviting Miami Beach Regional Library, which is a great place to pick up free wi-fi.
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Stiltsville
This collection of seven houses that stand on pilings out in Biscayne Bay has been around since the early ’30s. You can view them, way out in the distance, from the southern shore of the Bill Baggs park, or take a boat tour out there with the illustrious historian Dr Paul George. In 2003, the nonprofit Stiltsville Trust was set up by the National Parks Service to rehabilitate the buildings into as-yet-unknown facilities; proposals include a National Parks Service visitor center, artist-in-residence colony or community center. For updates, call the Stiltsville Trust on [tel] 305-443-2266.
reviewed
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Lowe Art Museum
Your love of the Lowe depends on your taste in art. If you’re into modern and contemporary works, it’s good. If you’re into the art and archaeology of cultures from Asia, Africa and the South Pacific, it’s great. And if you’re into pre-Columbian and Mesoamerican art, it’s simply fantastic; the artifacts are stunning and thoughtfully strung out along an easy-to-follow narrative thread. That isn’t to discount the lovely permanent collection of Renaissance and Baroque art, Western sculpture from the 18th to 20th centuries, and paintings by Gauguin, Picasso and Monet; they’re also gorgeous.
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Brickell Avenue Bridge
Crossing the Miami River, this lovely bridge between SE 4th St and SE 5th St was made wider and higher several years ago, which was convenient for the speedboat-driving drug runners being chased by Drug Enforcement Administration agents on the day of the bridge’s grand reopening! Note the 17ft bronze statue by Cuban-born sculptor Manuel Carbonell of a Tequesta warrior and his family, which sits perched atop the towering Pillar of History column. It can be tough to appreciate the bridge from your car; you may want to walk here to get a sense of the sculptures.
reviewed
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Historical Museum of Southern Florida
It takes a special kind of history to create the idiosyncratic character of a place like South Florida, and it takes a special kind of museum to capture that narrative. This place, located in the Miami-Dade Cultural Center, does just that, weaving together the stories of the region’s successive waves of population, from American Indians to Nicaraguans. It’s interesting for kids and open late (10am to 9pm) on the third Thursday of the month. Get off the Metromover at Government Center stop.
reviewed
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Living Room
Just to remind you that you’re entering the Design District is a big, honking, public art installation of, yep, a living room, just the sort of thing you’re supposed to shop for while you’re here. Actually this Living Room, by Argentine husband-and-wife team Roberto Behar and Rosario Marquardt, is an ‘urban intervention’ meant to be a criticism of the disappearance of public space, but we think it serves as a nice metaphor for the Design District as a whole: a contemporary interior plopped into the middle of urban decay.
reviewed
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Freedom Tower
Designed by the New York architectural firm of Shultz & Weaver in 1925, this tower is one of two surviving towers modeled after the Giralda bell tower in Spain’s Cathedral of Seville (the second is at the Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables). The ‘Ellis Island of the South,’ it served as an immigration processing center for almost half a million Cuban refugees in the 1960s. Placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979, it was also home to the Miami Daily News for 32 years.
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Dade County Courthouse
If you end up on trial here, at least you’ll get a free tour of one of the most imposing courthouses in the USA. When Miami outgrew its first courthouse it moved legal proceedings to this neoclassical icon, built between 1925 and 1929 for $4 million. It’s a very…appropriate building; if structures were people, the courthouse would definitely be a judge. Some useless trivia: back in the day, the top nine floors served as a ‘secure’ prison, from which more than 70 prisoners escaped.
reviewed
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Coral Gables City Hall
This grand building has housed boring city-commission meetings since it opened in 1928. It’s impressive from any angle, certainly befitting its importance as a central government building. Check out Denman Fink’s Four Seasons ceiling painting in the tower, as well as his framed, untitled painting of the underwater world on the 2nd-floor landing. There’s a small farmers market on-site from 8am to 1pm, January to March.
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Pinecrest Gardens
When Parrot Jungle flew the coop for the big city, the village of Pinecrest, which is the community that hosted the Jungle’s former location, purchased the lovely property in order to keep it as a municipal park. It’s now a quiet oasis with some of the best tropical gardens this side of the Gulf of Mexico, there are also playgrounds, and classrooms that house a bevy of adult-education culture and arts classes.
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Chess Hall of Fame
You’d think chess fanatics would have orderly minds and be good at scheduling, but this museum was closed both times we visited, despite coming during regular hours. So we can only tell you that the Chess HoF is located in a big, white rooklike structure with a sword-in-the-stone out front (seriously), and is apparently filled with paraphernalia such as Bobby Fischer’s table and ancient chess accoutrement.
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Coconut Grove Playhouse
Miami’s oldest theater premiered Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot in 1956 (the show was apparently a disaster), but was shut down during its 50th-anniversary season due to major debt issues. Now the board of the theater, in conjunction with Miami-Dade’s Department of Cultural Affairs, is trying to resurrect this grande dame; check the theater website for updates.
reviewed
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Alhambra Entrance
Coral Gables–designer George Merrick planned a series of elaborate entry gates to the city, but the real-estate bust meant that projects went unfinished. Among the completed gates worth seeing is the Alhambra Entrance.
reviewed
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Douglas Entrance
Coral Gables–designer George Merrick planned a series of elaborate entry gates to the city, but the real-estate bust meant that projects went unfinished. Among the completed gates worth seeing is the Douglas Entrance.
reviewed
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Coral Way Entrance
Coral Gables–designer George Merrick planned a series of elaborate entry gates to the city. Among the completed gates worth seeing is the Coral Way Entrance.
reviewed
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Granada Entrance
Coral Gables–designer George Merrick planned a series of elaborate entry gates to the city. The Granada Entrance is among the completed gates worth seeing.
reviewed
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Country Club Prado
Coral Gables–designer George Merrick planned a series of elaborate entry gates to the city. One of the gates worth seeing is the Country Club Prado.
reviewed
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Sterling Building
The Sterling Building, on Lincoln Rd, has been designed by Morris Lapidus, one of the founders of the loopy, neo-Baroque Miami-Beach style.
reviewed
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Alhambra Watertower
The Alhambra Watertower, where Greenway Ct and Ferdinand St meet Alhambra Circle, resembles a Moorish lighthouse.
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