When everybody thinks about the most beautiful buildings in Miami, they immediately go to Ocean Drive Art Deco. And they wouldn’t be wrong, of course, but they’d also be excluding a whole bunch of other architecture that makes Miami special. Beyond Ocean Drive, you’ll find Miami’s most stunning buildings among the best Miami hotels, the best museums in Miami and the best Miami attractions.
Here are the most beautiful buildings in Miami that you need to see before you leave town.
The Freedom Tower
The Freedom Tower is the main building of the rebuilt World Trade Center complex in Lower Manhattan, New York City. Designed by David Childs of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, One World Trade Center is the tallest building in the United States, the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere, and the seventh-tallest in the world. The supertall structure has the same name as the North Tower of the original World Trade Center, which was destroyed in the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. The new skyscraper stands on the northwest corner of the 16-acre (6.5 ha). It is bounded by West Street to the west, Vesey Street to the north, Fulton Street to the south, and Washington Street to the east.
One World Trade Center became the tallest structure in New York City on April 30, 2012, when it surpassed the height of the Empire State Building. The tower's steel structure was topped out on August 30, 2012. On May 10, 2013, the final component of the skyscraper's spire was installed, making the building, including its spire, reach a total height of 1,776 feet (541 m). Its height in feet is a deliberate reference to the year when the United States Declaration of Independence was signed. The building opened on November 3, 2014, the One World Observatory opened on May 29, 2015.
On March 26, 2009, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey (PANYNJ) confirmed that the building would be officially known by its legal name of "One World Trade Center", rather than its colloquial name of "Freedom Tower". The building has 94 stories, with the top floor numbered 104.
The new World Trade Center complex will eventually include five high-rise office buildings built along Greenwich Street, as well as the National September 11 Memorial & Museum, located just south of One World Trade Center where the original Twin Towers stood.
The Fontainebleau Hotel
The Fontainebleau Hotel is a hotel in Miami Beach, Florida. Designed by Morris Lapidus, the luxury hotel opened in 1954. In 2007, the Fontainebleau Hotel was ranked ninety-third in the American Institute of Architects list of "America's Favorite Architecture". On April 18, 2012, the AIA's Florida Chapter ranked the Fontainebleau first on its list of Florida Architecture.
The hotel was built by hotelier Ben Novack on the grounds of the former Harvey Firestone estate. Novack owned and operated the hotel until its bankruptcy in 1977.
The great architect Morris Lapidus built the Fontainebleau Hotel with a singular goal in mind: to turn heads. And since 1954, it has been doing just that with every detail. From its 11 different pools to the famous “staircase to nowhere”—this is a true example of classic Miami Beach opulence.
Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts
The Arsht Center is a performing arts center located in Miami, Florida. It is one of the largest performing arts centers in the United States.
The center was partly built on the site of a former Sears department store; an Art Deco building constructed in 1929, pre-dating the Art Deco hotels on Ocean Drive. It was added to the United States National Register of Historic Places in 1997 as Sears, Roebuck and Company Department Store. The department store space itself had been demolished and developers decided to preserve the tower and incorporate it into the new performing arts center. It has been adapted as a bookstore-café called the Café at Books & Books.
The center was designed by César Pelli and occupies two 570,000 square feet (53,000 m2) sites straddling Biscayne Boulevard connected by a pedestrian bridge. Acoustics were designed by Russell Johnson of Artec Consultants company. He also worked at the Meyerson Symphony Center in Dallas.
The Garage Museum of Contemporary Art
The Garage Museum of Contemporary Art, also referred to simply as The Garage Museum, is a privately funded art gallery in Moscow. It was founded by Dasha Zhukova and Roman Abramovich as the Garage Center for Contemporary Culture in 2008 and was renamed on 1 May 2014. Since June 2015, it has been housed in a building designed by the Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas.
As well as providing permanent collections and changing exhibitions, the museum also operates as a research center. It has archives relating to Russian contemporary art from the 1950s. It also runs educational programmes and publishes material relating to current developments in Russian and international art and culture.
Miami has a thing for beautiful parking garages and—as a city that drives just about everywhere—we ain’t complaining. The newest and, arguably, most remarkable entry into our roster of stellar parking garages is the Museum Garage in the Design District. Five different architects collaborated on this cartoon.
Vizcaya Museum & Gardens
The Vizcaya Museum and Gardens is the former villa and estate of businessman James Deering, of the Deering McCormick-International Harvester fortune, on Biscayne Bay in the present-day Coconut Grove neighborhood of Miami, Florida. The early 20th-century Vizcaya estate also includes extensive Italian Renaissance gardens, native woodland landscape, and a historic village outbuildings compound.
The landscape and architecture were influenced by Veneto and Tuscan Italian Renaissance models and designed in the Mediterranean Revival architecture style, with Baroque elements. F. Burrall Hoffman was the architect, Iwahiko Tsumanuma was the associate architect, Paul Chalfin was the design director, and Diego Suarez was the landscape architect.
Miami-Dade County now owns the Vizcaya property, as the Vizcaya Museum and Gardens, which is open to the public. The location is served by the Vizcaya Station of the Miami Metrorail.
Olympia Theater
The Olympia Theater is a theater located in Miami, Florida. Designed by John Eberson in his famed atmospheric style, the theater opened in 1926. Throughout its history, the venue has served as a movie theater, concert venue and performing arts center. In 1984, it received historical designation by the NRHP. The Olympia Theater and its sister venue, the Tampa Theatre are the only remaining atmospheric theaters in Florida.
The atmospheric theater was built in 1926 and has somehow withstood time and wealthy developers to remain a true relic stuffed smack in the middle of Downtown Miami. Arrive early for any performance here to take in the Moorish architecture and simulated night sky. It’s truly a throwback experience you just don’t see anymore.
The Biltmore Hotel
The Miami Biltmore Hotel, or The Biltmore, is a luxury hotel in Coral Gables, Florida. The hotel was designed by Schultze and Weaver and built in 1926 by John McEntee Bowman and George Merrick as part of the Biltmore hotel chain. The hotel's tower is inspired by the Giralda, the medieval tower of the cathedral of Seville.
When completed in 1926, the Biltmore became the tallest building in Florida at 315 feet (96 m), holding the record as Florida's tallest building until 1928 when the Dade County Courthouse was built. It served as a hospital during World War II and as a Veterans Administration Hospital and campus of the University of Miami medical school until 1968. The hotel was then abandoned for many years before again restoring operations as a hotel in 1987. In 1986, Miami Biltmore Hotel was designated a National Historic Landmark.
1111 Lincoln Road
1111 Lincoln Road is a parking garage in the South Beach section of Miami Beach, Florida, designed by the internationally known Swiss architectural firm of Herzog & de Meuron. It is located at the western end of the Lincoln Road Mall at the intersection with Alton Road, and can house some 300 cars. Since its opening in 2010, it has attracted considerable interest because its unique appearance is different from more traditional parking garage designs.
The design, led by Herzog & de Meuron partner Christine Binswanger, has been characterized as resembling a house of cards. It is an open-air structure with no exterior walls constructed around buttresses and cantilevers that features floor heights varying from 8 to 34 feet. Some of the internal ramps are quite steep in order to accommodate the wider height intervals. Elevators and a central, winding staircase take drivers to and from their cars. A glassed-in high-fashion boutique, Alchemist, sits on an edge of the fifth floor. The parking garage features retail space at the street level, with tenants such as Taschen books, Osklen clothing, Nespresso coffee and MAC cosmetics and is joined to the other structures that were part of the project. Wennett built a penthouse apartment for himself as part of a 18,000-square-foot (1,700 m2) space on the structure's roof that also features a pool and gardens with hanging vines. Jacques Herzog of the firm called the parking garage the most radical work they had ever done.
The Miami Tower
The Miami Tower is a 47-story, landmark office skyscraper in Miami, Florida, United States; previously known as the Bank Of America Tower and CenTrust Tower. It is located in central Downtown. It is currently the 16th tallest building in Miami and Florida. In 2022, the office skyscraper was purchased by DRA Advisors and CP Group, the largest office landlord in Downtown Miami and Florida.
Built for CenTrust Bank in 1987. Designed by the Pei Cobb Freed & Partners architectural firm, the tower consists of two separate structures: A 10-story parking garage owned by the city and the 47-story office tower built upon the air rights of the garage. Preliminary planning for the tower began in February 1980. The garage was completed in February 1983 and the tower began construction a year later.
The New World Center
The New World Center is a concert hall in the South Beach section of Miami Beach, Florida, designed by Frank Gehry. It is the home of the New World Symphony, with a capacity of 756 seats. It opened in January 2011.
Located one block north of Lincoln Road in the South Beach stretch of Miami Beach, the building also features a new 2.5-acre public park next to it. A half acre of that is the SoundScape area, which allows outside visitors to experience live, free "wallcasts" of select events throughout the season through the use of visual and audio technology on a 7,000-square-foot (650 m2) projection wall. Such wallcasts are planned to occur at least twice a month. A sound system incorporating 155 individually tuned speakers augments the high-definition video presentation. During performances, QR codes are shown to enable the outside audience to scan them and obtain more information about the work in question. In addition to live broadcasts of events inside, works in the video arts themselves can be shown on the wall. The projection wall is said to be the largest permanently established projection surface in North America.
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