760 Meridian Ave APT 1
Miami Beach, FL 33139

The Miami Beach Architectural District (also known as Old Miami Beach Historic District, and the more popular term, Miami Art Deco District) is a U.S. historic district (designated as such on May 14, 1979) located in the South Beach neighborhood of Miami Beach, Florida. The area was well known as the district where Italian fashion designer Gianni Versace resided, in a mansion on Ocean Drive. It is bounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Sixth Street to the south, Alton Road to the west, the Collins Canal and Dade Boulevard to the north. It contains 960 historic buildings.

 

Although most visitors never differentiate between the two, Miami Beach and South Beach are not synonymous. South Beach is the lower third of Miami Beach, comprising the southernmost 2.5 square miles of Miami Beach.

South Beach is a sexy, overwrought city, with hundreds of dramatic hotels and party settings, a worthy backdrop to Art Basel and many more significant international events.  Art Basel Miami Beach is the largest contemporary art fair in the U.S., drawing a record of 50,000 visitors.  

South Beach (also known as SoBe, or simply The Beach, the area from 1st street to about 25th street) is one of the more popular areas of Miami Beach. Topless sunbathing by women is illegal, but is officially tolerated on South Beach. Before the TV show Miami Vice helped make the area popular, SoBe was under urban blight, with vacant buildings and a high crime rate. Today, it is considered one of the richest commercial areas on the beach, yet poverty and crime still remain in some places near the area. 

Miami Beach is home to the New World Symphony, established in 1987 under the artistic direction of Michael Tilson Thomas. In January 2011, the New World Symphony made a highly publicized move into the New World Center building designed by Canadian American Pritzker Prize-winning architect Frank Gehry. Gehry is famous for his design of the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, and the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, California. The new Gehry building offers Live Wallcasts™, which allow visitors to experience select events throughout the season at the half-acre, outdoor Miami Beach SoundScape through the use of visual and audio technology on a 7,000-square-foot (650 m2) projection wall. 

Ocean Drive is one of the most picturesque streets on Miami Beach with numerous Art Deco hotels lining the west side of the street north from 5th Street to 14th Place.The whimsical, pastel-painted buildings today are gentle reminders of a reawakening city after the dismal Depression era. 

But it's a lot more than just color. If you look carefully, you will see the intricacies and impressive craftsmanship that went into each building back in Miami in the '20s, '30s, '40s, and today, thanks to intensive restoration.

Lincoln Road, running east-west between 16th and 17th Streets, is a nationally known spot for outdoor dining, bicycling, rollerblading and shopping and features and galleries of well known designers, artists and photographers such as Romero Britto, Peter Lik, and Jonathan Adler. Lincoln Road Mall presents a world-class pedestrian shopping center full of renowned boutiques and inspired dining. The New World Symphony also calls the Lincoln Road area its home. The Fillmore theatre offers yet another show experience just down the street. Luxury hotels and resorts are also common place along the shorelines of Miami Beach. Some of these include the Fontainebleau, the Eden Roc, the W Hotel, the Gansevoort, as well as many others. A top-of-the-line convention center adds to the tourist appeal, bringing in tremendous shows and exhibits. Among these are the yacht and boat show, Art Basel, the auto show, the antique show, and many others.

The Arts:

The New World Symphony Orchestra, Miami Beach's major cultural calling card, is an orchestra of brilliant young music students directed by the famous conductor, Michael Tilson Thomas. 

Each December, the City of Miami Beach hosts Art Basel Miami Beach, one of the largest art shows in the United States. Art Basel Miami Beach, the sister event to the Art Basel event held each June in Basel, Switzerland, combines an international selection of top galleries with a program of special exhibitions, parties and crossover events featuring music, film, architecture and design. Exhibition sites are located in the city's Art Deco District, and ancillary events are scattered throughout the greater Miami metropolitan area. 

The Miami City Ballet, a ballet company founded in 1985, which is housed in a 63,000-square-foot building near Miami Beach's Bass Museum of Art. 

The Miami Beach Festival of the Arts is an annual outdoor art festival that was begun in 1974. 

Media:

Art Deco hotels in Miami Beach, particularly Ocean Drive part, were also featured prominently in the 1983 feature film Scarface and the 1996 comedy The Birdcage. 

In November 2007 and 2009, a multi-media art festival ("Sleepless Night") was held based on Nuit Blanche. The festival returns on November 5, 2011. 

Art Deco Historic District

In 1979 Miami Beach's Art Deco Historic District was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The Art Deco District is the largest collection of Art Deco architecture in the world and comprises hundreds of hotels, apartments and other structures erected between 1923 and 1943.

Art Deco Weekend is an annual festival which takes place each January on Miami Beach.

The Miami Design Preservation League (MDPL) is a non-profit organization devoted to preserving, protecting, and promoting the cultural, social, economic, environmental and architectural integrity of the Miami Beach Architectural Historic District and all other areas of the City of Miami Beach where historic preservation is a concern. It was originally organized by Barbara Capitman in 1976 and is the oldest Art Deco Society in the World.

Lincoln Road was designed in 1914 and has served as a social center for Miami Beach. In 1960, six blocks of the road were closed to vehicles and converted to a pedestrian mall, designed by hotel architect Morris Lapidus.Today, the nation’s second outdoor pedestrian mall, is still known for its shopping, dining and people watching.

“I designed Lincoln Road for people – a car never bought anything.”- Lapidus