Our Fort Lauderdale logo carries Florida's alligator, above “Est. 1845,” the year of Florida statehood — the shared emblem of every Merlin Classics Florida place. Printed in a worn black-and-white that recalls an old crate stamp, the alligator is Florida in shorthand: tough, native, and at home in the water. The alligator is the through-line that links Fort Lauderdale to every other Florida town we make. What makes this one Fort Lauderdale is everything around it — the New River, the 165 miles of canals, Las Olas, and the Venice of America.
Today Fort Lauderdale is the Venice of America — a city of canals and yachts, a great beach and a busy river, with a frontier fort and a trading post somewhere underneath it all. Its story runs from a Tequesta river and an 1838 Seminole-War fort, through Frank Stranahan's 1893 trading post and the 1920s canal boom, to the yachting and cruise capital it is now. Our Fort Lauderdale designs gather that identity into wearable form — the alligator emblem, the New River, and the canals. Fort Lauderdale, Florida: the Venice of America, on the New River where the city began.
Why People Visit Fort Lauderdale
Fort Lauderdale offers South Florida at its most nautical — a real beach city laced with canals, with a historic river downtown, a great cruise port, and the yachting world's calendar built around it. Visitors come for the water, the beaches, and the Venice-of-America canals, and stay for Las Olas, the Riverwalk, and the easy coastal pace. From the New River to the sand, it rewards a day or a week. It is bright, nautical, and genuinely South Florida.
