What to See in Miami Beach - Top Sights and Attractions

Outdoor museum with iconic statue and wall. The Holocaust Memorial of the Greater Miami Jewish Federation is a Holocaust memorial at 1933-1945 Meridian Avenue, in Miami Beach, Florida.

It was conceived by a committee of Holocaust survivors in 1984, formally established in 1985 as the Holocaust Memorial Committee, a non-profit organization.

The memorial was designed by Kenneth Treister on a site designated by the City of Miami Beach Commission at Meridian Avenue and Dade Boulevard. This site was previously the home of Holocaust survivors William and Florrie Loeb and their son Robert, who immigrated from Rotterdam, Netherlands after the bombing and occupation by the Nazis. They purchased the home in the 1940s and Florrie sold it to the city of Miami Beach in the early 1970s who had plans to make it into a parking lot. There remain trees in the back of the Memorial that were planted by the original owners of the property in the 1920s and 1930s.

The memorial was opened on Sunday, February 4, 1990, with Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel as guest speaker at the dedication ceremonies. Miami Attorney and Holocaust survivor Andrew C. Hall serves as chairman^[4]

Museum in Miami Beach, Florida. The Wolfsonian–Florida International University or The Wolfsonian-FIU, located in the heart of the Art Deco District of Miami Beach, Florida, is a museum, library and research center that uses its collection to illustrate the persuasive power of art and design. For fifteen years, The Wolfsonian has been a division within Florida International University.

The Wolfsonian's two collections comprise approximately 180,000 pieces from the period 1885 to 1945 — the height of the Industrial Revolution until the end of the Second World War — in a variety of media, including: furniture; industrial-design objects; works in glass; ceramics; metal; rare books; periodicals; ephemera; works on paper; paintings; textiles; and medals. The museum is an affiliate within the Smithsonian Affiliations program, sharing affiliation with the Frost Art Museum.

The countries most strongly represented are Germany, Great Britain, Italy, the Netherlands, and the United States. There are also significant holdings from a number of other countries, including Austria, Czechoslovakia, France, Hungary, Japan, and the former Soviet Union. Among the collection’s strengths are: the British Arts & Crafts movement; Dutch and Italian variants of the Art Nouveau style; American industrial design; objects and publications from world’s fairs; propaganda from the First and Second World Wars and the Spanish Civil War; New Deal graphic and decorative arts; avant-garde book design; and publications and design drawings relating to architecture.^[5]

Neighborhood in Miami Beach, Florida. South Beach, also nicknamed SoBe, is a neighborhood in the city of Miami Beach, Florida, United States, located due east of Miami city proper between Biscayne Bay and the Atlantic Ocean. The area encompasses Miami Beach south of Dade Boulevard.

This area was the first section of Miami Beach to be developed, starting in the 1910s, due to the development efforts of Carl G. Fisher, the Lummus Brothers, and John S. Collins, the latter of whose construction of the Collins Bridge provided the first vital land link between mainland Miami and the beaches.

The area has gone through numerous artificial and natural changes over the years, including a booming regional economy, increased tourism, and the 1926 hurricane, which destroyed much of the area. As of 2010, 39,186 people lived in South Beach.^[6]

Building complex in Miami Beach, Florida. The Blue and Green Diamonds are twin towers in Miami Beach, Florida, United States. They are both 559 feet and 44 floors. They are the tallest buildings in Miami Beach, and were both completed in 2000. The towers, mirror image of each other, share a full service, stand-alone Clubhouse building designed to look like the early mansions of the rich and famous that once dotted the 1920s Miami Beach shoreline. The complex contains a multi-level parking garage with tennis courts atop. There is a large pool deck overlooking the beach and surrounded by private Cabana Units. The towers are typically 8 residential units per floor. The Tower Suites near the top are marked by the prominent wrap-around terraces. The top full floor features seven Penthouse units, six of which are two story with private Roof Terraces and plunge pools. The Blue Diamond and Green Diamond were known for being the tallest oceanfront residential towers in the United States until Jade Beach and Jade Ocean were built in Sunny Isles Beach, Florida, in 2008 and 2009.

The Towers are on Collins Avenue, north of the Eden Roc Hotel.^[7]

Botanical garden in Miami Beach, Florida. The Miami Beach Botanical Garden is a 2.6 acres urban green space in Miami Beach, Florida founded in 1962. It was transformed in 2011 with a $1.2 million landscape renovation designed by South Florida landscape architect Raymond Jungles. The new landscape showcases native Florida plants and trees including bromeliads, palms, cycad, orchids and many others. There is a Japanese garden, native garden and bio-swale, and water gardens including ponds, fountains, and a wetland with mangrove and pond apple trees. The renovation also expanded the Great Lawn area for corporate and social events, established a plant nursery and event plaza, and enhanced the night-time lights, entrance gate, and pathways.

The Garden offers free admission and is open Tuesday to Sunday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.^[10]

Live music venue in Miami Beach, Florida. 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, designed by the firm West 8 (after Gehry relinquished the job following a budget reduction). 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, including those produced during the Art Basel Miami Beach event. The projection wall is said to be the largest permanently established projection surface in North America.

Over a thousand people watched the wallcasts during each of the performances in the center's opening week. By the end of the park's first year, The Miami Herald wrote that the free films, video art, and concert wallcasts there had "produced a much-needed sense of community."^[13]

Synagogue. Temple Beth Shmuel or Cuban Hebrew Congregation of Miami is a synagogue used by Ashkenazi Jewish Cuban expatriates in Miami Beach, Florida. "Approximately 94 percent of Cuba’s Jewish population fled after the Revolution." The synagogue was founded in 1961 by Felix Reyler, Oscar White, and Bernardo Benes. Its current location at 1700 North Michigan Avenue opened in 1975, with an expansion in 1982. The congregation is led by Rabbi Stephen Texon and Baal Koreh Jacques Malka. It currently hosts 170 member households and has a Montessori School.

The temple was designed by Oscar Sklar. It includes stained glass windows of the Twelve Tribes of Israel designed by Inge Pape Trampler. Mexican artist Naomi Siegman designed the candelabras beside the bimah. The synagogue is named for Shmuel Schacter, father of Jack Chester.^[14]