Here now are starchitet Richard Meier's and Kobi Karp's designs for the planned restoration/condoization/hotelizaton of Miami Beach's grand old Surf Club, that once private refuge for Miami's patrician (and just Anglo-Saxon) elite. They were submitted to the city of Surfside for permit approvals, historic approval, etc. Although Meier was brought into the project to add his own je ne sai quoi to the joint, it had already been designed once by Kobi.
The incredibly historic 1929 mediterranean revival building by Russell Pancoast, one of Miami's first architects, will be restored, later additions removed, and three new towers will be added, including one - the hotel building - that goes straight through one of the Club's historic courtyards to form an architecturally uber-dramatic hotel lobby. It then cantilevers out over other parts of the old structure, including the Club's original ballroom. What was once very private is now very public, with the Club's central hallway, called 'peacock alley', linking Collins Avenue to the beach and its other public spaces turned over to the hotel's use.
What remain of the original, curving, cabanas will be restored and relocated, releasing valuable real estate for the project's additional buildings. Pools (at least three of them) are added in the building's project's expansive outdoor areas, and long lawns with wide vistas lead out to the ocean. In total, on the east side of Collins Avenue Meier and Karp have somehow found available real estate (or at least empty air space) for three large glassy buildings of about twelve stories which, although not tremendously tall, are at a totally different scale (perhaps out of scale?) with the original Club building. And, has always been planned, the Club's old tennis courts to the west will be replaced with parking and some low-rise residential. Do check out another rendering of the new designs, scored by the Miami Herald, here.
· Surf Club coverage [Curbed Miami]
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