The Tequesta fished and hunted at the mouth of the Miami River for thousands of years before European contact. The Spanish came in 1513 with Juan Ponce de León, lost Florida to the British in 1763, took it back in 1783, and surrendered it to the United States in 1821; Florida became the 27th state on March 3, 1845. The American territorial era brought the Seminole Wars — Fort Dallas, on the north bank of the Miami River, was one of the military installations of that long campaign, and it was on the Fort Dallas land that Julia Tuttle would later build her city. William and Mary Brickell were already there when she arrived, trading on the south bank of the river; Mary Brickell became, after Tuttle, the Other Mother of Miami, and the Brickell name stayed on the downtown financial district south of the river.
Our Miami retro logo carries Florida's alligator and the date "1845" stamped beneath, for the year Florida became the 27th state of the Union. The black-and-white styling is retro, in the vocabulary of crate labels, mid-century beach signage, and the painted hotel placards that once ran the length of Ocean Drive. The alligator and the date do the work of placing the design in the founding generation of the state — and the city that was incorporated by a Cleveland widow with an orange blossom, built three times in three short bursts, and that has held the world's largest concentration of Art Deco architecture longer than any other city has held a 20th-century historic district.
Why People Visit Miami Florida
- Walk the Miami Beach Art Deco Historic District — the world's largest concentration of Art Deco architecture, with 800-plus buildings built between 1923 and 1943 in the Tropical Deco style on the South Beach barrier island. The district was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on May 14, 1979, as the nation's first 20th-century urban historic district. Start at the Art Deco Welcome Center on Ocean Drive at 10th Street and walk north up Ocean Drive past the Colony Hotel (Henry Hohauser, 1935), then west along Espanola Way and Lincoln Road.
- Tour Vizcaya Museum & Gardens at 3251 South Miami Avenue in Coconut Grove — James Deering's Italian Renaissance and Mediterranean Revival winter villa built 1914-1922 by architect F. Burrall Hoffman with artistic director Paul Chalfin and Colombian landscape architect Diego Suarez. Thirty-four rooms in the main house, ten acres of formal gardens on Biscayne Bay, and the stone barge breakwater out in the water. Designated a National Historic Landmark in 1994.
- Visit the Freedom Tower at 600 Biscayne Boulevard — the Schultze and Weaver Mediterranean Revival 17-story tower opened July 26, 1925, modeled on the Giralda bell tower of the Cathedral of Seville, that served from 1962 to 1974 as the Cuban Refugee Center, the "Ellis Island of the South." Listed on the National Register of Historic Places September 10, 1979, and designated a National Historic Landmark on October 6, 2008.
- Walk Coral Gables — George Merrick's 1925 Mediterranean Revival planned city. See the Venetian Pool (1924), the Biltmore Hotel (Schultze and Weaver, 1926), Miracle Mile, and Coral Way under the banyans.
- Stroll Calle Ocho through Little Havana — the historic Cuban-American main street, with the 1926 Mediterranean Revival Tower Theater at 1508 SW 8th Street, the rollers at El Titán de Bronce, the café cubano windows, and the domino tables of Máximo Gómez Park at 15th Avenue.
- Walk Ocean Drive past Casa Casuarina at 1116 Ocean Drive — built in 1930 by Alden Freeman as a Mediterranean Revival reimagining of the Alcázar de Colón in Santo Domingo, now part of the architectural frame of the Art Deco District. Continue north up Collins Avenue to the Fontainebleau (Morris Lapidus, 1954), the defining MiMo (Miami Modern) hotel.
- Visit the Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM) at Museum Park — the 2013 Herzog & de Meuron building on Biscayne Bay.
- Walk Wynwood Walls and the Wynwood arts district — outdoor murals and galleries north of Downtown.
- Drive across the Venetian Causeway (1925) for the island-hopping route from Downtown Miami to Miami Beach, or the Rickenbacker Causeway south to Key Biscayne, or the Julia Tuttle Causeway across mid-bay.
- Visit Bayfront Park downtown on Biscayne Bay — see the Julia Tuttle sculpture by Daub and Firmin honoring the city's founder.
- Drive south to Biscayne National Park and the start of the Florida Keys at Key Largo, or west to Everglades National Park.
- See the Miami Marine Stadium on Virginia Key — the 1963 Brutalist concrete grandstand by architect Hilario Candela, listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
