The construction, at last, is nearing completion.
Nearly 25 years after urban planner Craig Robins erected his first property in the then-beleaguered district for interior designers, the latest $1.4 billion expansion of the Miami Design District is nearly complete.
The barricades and cement trucks that occupied Northeast First Avenue disappeared. They have already opened the streets that were blocked to traffic, as well as sidewalks and spaces for walking in the area. Art installations and squares are now open to the public. Robins kept in the Design District some historic gems such as the Moore Building, which was built in 1921, mixing with modernist buildings, spectacular facades and art installations such as the dome designed by Buckminster Fuller, which is large enough to walk through.
Two new museums have opened free to the public, in addition to luxury stores such as Gucci and Rag & Bone. Cuban restaurant Estefan Kitchen has been open since March 2017, serving black beans and ropa vieja with live music. The Nite Owl Theater has been showing cult and classic films since August.
More attractions are on the way, including four celebrity restaurants and a seven-story parking lot with crazy, photogenic facades designed by six different artists.
But despite the attention of major media outlets like The New York Times and Vogue, free weekly concerts and monthly family events, Miami’s Design District remains an unknown celebrity in its own hometown. The Design District spans 18 blocks north of downtown Miami, from NE 38 to 42 Street between N Miami Ave. and Biscayne Blvd.
“There’s a challenge to publicizing what’s being done,” said Robins, chief executive and president of development for Dacra, which currently owns 900,000 square feet of properties in the 25-acre Design District. “We could have bought a million light ads and put ‘We are the Design District’. But the Design District is authenticity. You have to remain who you are and hope that, over time, you will attract more and more people. We are putting up signs to attract you, but you have to come and find out on your own.”
But Robins hopes these events will appeal to local residents who see the Design District as a place to spend thousands of dollars on a Louis Vuitton handbag. He wants them to know that they can also watch original works by Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein for free, grab a sandwich or burrito at the casual OTL café, or enjoy an ice cream cone served by one of Miami’s best-known chefs.
A different kind of shops
Critics and competitors say the Design District falls short of its potential as a retail hub. Currently, the area is home to more than 80 shops and boutiques and 70 design rooms for the home. But that traditional market of strong sales – with customers carrying piles of shopping bags as they stroll the streets – is relatively rare.
Recently, on a Saturday night, few pedestrians were seen in the neighborhood squares. Empty tables in restaurants were plentiful. Those beautiful, gleaming shops were mostly empty.
That’s unusual in Miami-Dade’s retail market scene, which is one of the most robust in the United States. Overall, 2016 sales reached $55 billion, according to Cushman & Wakefield’s fall Miami sales report. The nation’s most popular mall, Bal Harbour Shops had sales of $3,185 per square foot, according to a 2016 ranking by research firm Green Street Advisors, despite fierce competition that led some famous retailers to quit. Bal Harbour by the Design District.
Pasticceria Marchesi, one of the oldest bakeries in Milan, opened its first store dedicated to traditional Italian ice cream in Miami’s Design District.
But some experts say it’s too early to judge the Design District’s growth, because the area remains a project in progress. Over the next six months, four new restaurants from culinary stars Brad Kilgore, Joël Robuchon and Jean-Georges Vongerichten will arrive. There will also be a large chain of salon restaurants, St. Roch Market, with 12 restaurants. Dolce & Gabbana, Balenciaga and Céline stores will debut soon. A music and film superstar is said to be considering launching his own restaurant there.
“Building a neighborhood is a process — it doesn’t happen overnight,” said Tony Cho, founder and CEO of Metro 1, whose office is based in nearby Edgewater. “You can’t expect to see a lot of traffic while the place is still under construction. The Design District is a multi-year, multi-phase project. Craig is doing the right thing and keeping parking costs down.”
An analysis published this week by Fung Global Retail & Technology cited leisure shopping — stores surrounded by restaurants, entertainment venues and service businesses — as one of the biggest potential growth areas for the retail industry. That would give the Design District locality a distinct advantage over traditional shopping malls.
“I love seeing what happens to a neighborhood when it’s really a creative lab and not just a mall,” Robins said. “People who come here see that it’s something unique. This is something that cannot be experienced in a shopping mall. This can only happen in a real urban environment.”
Another fact that also favors the Design District: its average rent per square foot is $163, which is higher than Coral Gables ($53) or Brickell Avenue ($110), but less than Bal Harbour ($300) and Aventura ($200).
Despite the construction schedule of work in progress over the past decade, Design District improvements have helped raise property values in nearby areas. The median price of single-family homes in ZIP code 33137 — which includes Buena Vista, the residential neighborhood directly north and east of the area — more than doubled between 2012 and 2017, soaring 136 percent from $248,438 to $587,450, according to Property Shark.
Stephen Rutchik, executive vice president of Colliers International, hopes the Design District will also help attract tenants to the nearby Gateway at Wynwood, home to 200,000 square feet of office space on North Miami Avenue and Northwest 29th Street, which is expected to open in 2019.
“Any of these three districts alone, Wynwood, Midtown or the Design District, would not be compatible with this office space,” Rutchik said. “It’s the critical mass that comes from those three neighborhoods combined that makes tenants look beyond the urban core. The Design District has reached its tipping point: it has helped raise the foundations of Miami.”
Increase sales
Within the Design District, sales are going in the right direction, Robins said. Although individual stores don’t disclose revenue, Robins said more than a dozen retailers reported a 50-100 percent year-over-year increase in sales in January 2018. The number of vehicles parked inside City View’s garage (which intentionally has low prices, at $3 for four hours, to encourage visitors) has increased 50 percent per month since June 2017 (with the exception of September, due to Hurricane Irma). Ellen Salpeter, director of the Miami Institute of Contemporary Art, said the museum has attracted 30,000 visitors since it opened in December.
And even though Hermès’ giant flagship store (one of three in the United States) sometimes looks empty, these international brands are playing a longer-term role than traditional retail stores. They have the resources, and the intention, to wait until the Design District reaches its glory. By then, they will already be occupying privileged locations and enjoying maximum visibility.
Hermès President Robert Chavez said a flagship store in Miami “It allows us to manifest the brand in a very special and unique way. We love being ‘pioneers’ in new locations, and we partner with Craig for his vision. We can expand our assortment and offerings to our customers with more space, and we can also offer a more special shopping experience with greater comfort and amenities.”
Chavez also said his sales at the Design District’s 13,000-square-foot store are 40 percent higher than last year at his previous 4,300-square-foot boutique in Bal Harbour Shops, which closed in 2012.
Art and real estate
Robins began his real estate career with a $20,000 investment with the late developer Tony Goldman in 1986. They used the money to invest in two buildings on Fifth Avenue in then-sleepy South Beach. But before the revitalization of South Beach was complete, Robins was already working on his next projects, on the site of the former St. Francis Hospital in Miami Beach and in the Design District.
“Back then, there were mostly furniture stores there,” said Brian L. Bilzin, founding partner of law firm Bilzin Sumberg, who has represented Dacra on several development projects. “It was always his vision to turn the Design District into a community and a destination.”
They have helped him. Dacra currently co-owns 70 percent of the Design District with an investment unit of French product maker LVMH and General Growth Properties, the U.S. firm that also owns Bayside Marketplace and Shops in Merrick Park. The remaining 30 percent of the Design District is owned by various investors. Robins oversees its day-to-day operations.
Robins has always mixed real estate with art. One of its first South Beach tenants was artist Keith Haring. At the previous hospital location, Dacra Development brought in urban planning designers Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk to create Aqua, a pedestrian-friendly island with townhouses and apartment buildings designed by several architects.
The Design District’s emphasis on culture and entertainment is already reaping unexpected benefits. Filmmaker Harmony Korine (Spring Breakers) is editing her Miami-based comedy The Beach Bum, starring Matthew McConaughey and Zac Efron, in a Design District space. He also agreed to collaborate with Nayib Estefan, founder of the Secret Celluloid Society, on a retrospective festival at the Nite Owl Theater.
“Craig has turned the Design District into a very interesting and creative place where many different worlds collide,” Korine said during a recent break in editing the film. “I like the atmosphere here, the way it looks and feels. It’s kind of a creative playground. There are works of art, cafes and clothes.”
And there’s much more to come, including two hotels to be completed in 2020. A residential urbanization is practically inevitable.
Source: https://www.elnuevoherald.com/