More than 20 years ago, Ian Schrager created the Delano, and gave Miami a cool cachet. Now with his new hotel, he’s readying the city for the future. And we can’t wait to visit.
One of the few hotel lobbies in Miami Beach to offer a view of the ocean, the spirit of the space, like the hotel itself, can be summarised as “barefoot chic,” or “new tropical” (read: casual elegance, informal glamour).
The new Edition represents the most important step forward for the city since the moment when Schrager’s last Miami hotel, the Delano, opened in 1992 — and changed everything. “Up till then there hadn’t been a new hotel built in Miami Beach in almost forty years,” Schrager recalls. But in the early 1990s, Schrager sensed that something exciting and fresh was emerging in the historic Art Deco blocks of South Beach: a new population, and new kind of cultural energy. (I have to admit, I was there in 1989, and all I could smell was salt and tequila.) Building on his epiphany, the hotelier created the Delano — and suddenly Miami Beach was on the map.
Miami has it all – sun, sea, accessibility and cultural value – to become a major player besides New York and Los Angeles. For regular guests, there is also a village of 28 private bungalows landscaped to feel more like a botanical garden than a conventional hotel.
Two decades later, the Miami Beach Edition represents the next great seminal event in the life of the city. Like its predecessor, it is built upon a realisation about the profound shifts and changes that have transformed Miami since the Delano opened. No longer merely a getaway spot for people seeking a break from winter, Miami has emerged as a world-class capital, a 24-hour gateway city whose cultural scenes — in art, architecture, music, fashion, cuisine, design — now rival any of the world’s urban centers. The success of Art Basel Miami testifies to the cultural and artistic importance of the city.
Each of the 294 rooms carry through the hotel’s mission to become a place where recreation and work can blend into one comfortable whole, through features — from oversized desks to ergonometric seating to sophisticated lighting — that allow them to serve equally well as micro-workspaces as places of retreat.
Located in the Mid-Beach area — the historic “heart of Miami Beach” between South Beach and North Beach — the new Edition is not merely a hotel, but an intricately interlinked complex of structures, spaces, and settings designed to offer a new kind of resort environment, where every aspect of the traditional beach hotel has been re-imagined, and every thought given to enhancing a guest’s stay: for vacation, for relaxation — and for work.
The Matador Room, the hotel’s main restaurant — a grandly proportioned space that recalls all the sophistication of Miami Beach’s heyday (the kind of place, Schrager says, “one might expect to see Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers waltzing through”).
On the beach side of the hotel are two stylish interior spaces that will evoke classic Miami Beach elegance and sophistication: the Ocean Bar, a chic, elegantly designed lounge whose wide glass walls overlook the Atlantic; and the Matador Room, where Michelin star chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten will create a modern interpretation of Latin cuisine influenced by Spanish, Caribbean and South American flavors.
Filled with a variety of comfortable seating groupings and intimate lounging areas, the lobby will embody the Edition’s next-generation spirit, a place where the lines between work and play, socialising and networking, begin to blur.
Today’s entrepreneurs, creatives and professionals want to work and network in places of comfort, style and human interaction – places where they can engage and feel connected. Miami Beach Edition carries this idea to an entirely new level, the first not only to integrate into its very design this new dynamic of working, networking and socialising, but the first to combine it with the elevated experience and superior level of comfort, convenience and features.
The central relaxation area of the spa, with custom-designed daybeds, is surrounded by drapery and vintage Moroccan rugs.
“There are thousands of boutique hotels out there — some are good, some are not so good; but they’re all replicating what Steve [Rubell] and I did. This is something else, a step forward. It’s a new kind of place — it’s the next-generation urban resort, and the next-generation business and lifestyle hotel. There’s nothing else like it on the beach or anywhere else,” adds Ian Schrager.
And what others are saying:
“…The Miami Beach Edition represents the next great seminal event in the life of the city.” Hotel Designs Online
“This is the place to be for Art Basel: The Miami Beach Edition.” Nylon
“New Edition brings fresh glamour to Miami Beach.” Miami Herald
See more at Miami Beach Edition
