Delano Miami Beach

About

In Delano Miami Beach, the story begins long before Philippe Starck added his signature theatrics. The white tower, completed in 1947 by Robert Swartburg, rose above Collins Avenue as one of the tallest buildings of its time. Its clean vertical lines signaled a shift away from ornate Art Deco toward the more restrained Miami Modern style, reflecting a city stepping confidently into the postwar era. Nearly fifty years later, Ian Schrager and Starck rewrote the script. The entrance sequence was conceived like a film set, drawing guests through oversized curtains and elongated spaces toward the famous pool, a visual axis stretching to the Atlantic. Underwater music, surreal proportions, and deliberately disorienting scale turned the hotel into a social stage. It became one of the first places where a hotel was no longer just a place to stay, but somewhere to arrive, linger, and be seen. That influence still lingers. The pool remains one of the most compelling settings on South Beach, and the garden offers a rare sense of seclusion just steps from the city’s constant motion. Yet the interiors, once radical, now reveal their age. What felt visionary in the mid nineties can come across as dated rather than timeless, with comfort occasionally sacrificed for effect. You come here for the architecture, the legacy, and the atmosphere that once reshaped Miami Beach. The experience carries weight, though it benefits from a certain tolerance for nostalgia.