Touring the Design District’s Big New Stuff in 88 Photos

The Miami Design District can seem incredibly unrecognizable from what it was just a few years ago, with the entire neighborhood seemingly being rebuilt within that time, and that sensation is particularly evident in the areas still under construction. Some of the old haunts are missed, of course, but there’s lots happening to be excited of course. Phase Two is big, people. If you were blown away by Phase One, mainly the new retail spaces along 40th street as well as the Garden Building and its roof garden, just wait until you see this. Fasten your seat belts kids, it’s going to be a fabulous and very expensive ride.

  • 39th Street, looking towards the Aranda/Lasch retail building.
  • Looking North, up Paseo Ponti
  • Many of the ‘blank’ facades are really just plaster-covered plywood temporary placeholders. When the raw spaces within them are handed over to retail clients for their buildouts these will be completely transformed.
  • Paseo Ponti, looking south. What now looks like an alley between two blank walls will become a vibrant shopping promenade and the blank walls will be gone.
  • Inside the buildings, the blank plywood used for the walls is visible.
  • Inside one of the future retail spaces.
  • 39th Street.
  • Looking east down 39th Street.
  • One of the pieces of land not owned by Dacra has had a little retail paseo built on it with Rolex and Longchamp shops. When this first popped up, it was hideous, but they must have done something to make it not quite so bad, and it nicely connects with the breezeway on 40th Street used by Michael’s Genuine Food & Drink. Those fans make the interior look pretty comfortable too.
  • Opposite the Rolex/Longchamp building is this little archway. It might not ever really go anywhere except to the back of the building next to it, because Dacra owns everything around it, but it sure looks like it could be the entrance to something cool.
  • The Aranda/Lasch retail building.
  • 39th Street. The bland-o box on the right will be something much cooler. That’s just a veneer for a retail store.
  • One of the Keenan/Riley retail buildings, this one is on NE 1st 40th Street.
  • Bland now, gorgeous in the future.
  • The underground parking garage is huge. Craig Robins is no dummy. Even though he’s building the Design District for pedestrians, he knows everyone will want to come by car, and he’s got to have room for them.
  • The wall panels in the garage have clever little wordy things on them, like this one over the motorcycle parking.
  • Signage!
  • Signage!
  • The elevator up to the surface.
  • This is the real entrance/exit to the parking garage, a grand, circular staircase that will ascend up into Buckminster Fuller’s Fly’s Eye Dome.
  • The ceiling/floor panels haven’t quite been installed here yet. There is the Palm Court, above.
  • A rear entrance to the Palm Court
  • The Palm Court, with the Buckminster Fuller Dome in the center.
  • The Sou Fujimoto Building is the big architectural moment of the Court.
  • Another striking architectural moment is the Aranda/Lasch event space, with a commanding view of the district, the Palm Court, and another smaller court on the second floor. Escalators and stairs (further up) connect all the spaces together creating dramatic moments of circulation.
  • More escalators lead to a catwalk atop retail spaces.
  • Paseo Ponti.
  • An uninstalled piece of the Fly’s Eye Dome waits to go into place.
  • The rooftop of the Bulgari Building, which is just the beginning of a network of roof gardens, has already had fully grown indigenous trees installed. Other buildings that will have roof gardens include those for Cartier, Hermes, Christian Dior, and Louis Vuitton, and they will be interconnected with each other.
  • The City View Garage, with designs by John Baldessari, Lelong Lelong, and Iwamoto Scott is off in the distance. To the right is a mural by graphic designers 2×4 who have been commission as part of the Design District’s graphic design program. That program will bring some of the great graphic designers from around the world to do murals in the district. They also pay homage to the murals of Wynwood.
  • This is the rear of that little building with the archway that Dacra doesn’t own. Still a mystery.
  • The Palm Court. Shade might be a bit of an issue, but they’ve probably thought of solutions for that too. Somebody should remember to ask about that.
  • This catwalk connects the west escalators to the Fujimoto retail building.
  • The Fujimoto retail facade has a lot of depth, with the upper level of retail recessed above the lower. The layers of blue glass must have some pretty major solar tinting on them, because it was not hot up here at all. It was quite comfortable.
  • More blank spaces for future retail tenants.
  • What’s with the big (obviously temporary) Tourbillon ad? There’s nobody here to see it, except construction workers who probably can’t afford it.
  • A walkway behind a retail structure leads to the Aranda/Lasch retail space.
  • Here, circulation is an art. Just picture the drama.
  • The upstairs bathrooms have already been fitted out. They probably turned the water off to prevent the messy construction workers from using these pristine facilities, not that we checked.
  • Rich marble: the perfect setting for doing your business.
  • Dyson air blades are seriously the only way to go until somebody invents a competing system that actually dries your hands without the use of towels. Considering how long air hand dryers existed before these puppies came out, that might be decades. Of course, high-end joints like this typically also have at least paper towels for your hand drying pleasure. If they want to go extremely upscale they might have cloth towels, but probably not at a mall.
  • The stalls have full-length (and we’re guessing somewhat sound-resistant) doors. Perfect to avoid hearing unwanted grunts or other noises. They could also be good spots to pay back that salesperson who gave you a really, really good deal on your new bling. Much more private than in-store dressing rooms.
  • The outdoor ceiling of the Aranda./Lasch event space is pretty coolio.
  • The upstairs courtyard as visible from the Aranda/Lasch space, and the rooftop behind it. That roof will have a site-specific design by artist Matthew Ritchie.
  • The parking entrance on 38th Street.
  • An archway or something. To the left is the current staging area for the construction. Something will eventually go there.
  • Another mural by 2×4.
  • The City View Garage, from NE 1st Avenue and 38th Street.
  • A patterned metallic facade adds spice to this portion of the garage. This side of the garage was designed by Iwamoto Scott.
  • False facades on NE 2nd Avenue, where stores will eventually go.
  • More false facades.
  • The JBL Building from NE 1st Avenue and 40th Street.
  • The rear of the Baldassari+friends garage.

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