Taking Picture-Perfect Portraits at Vizcaya Museum in Miami, Florida
Grab your favorite photographer, toe off your shoes and slip through time into a lush subtropical forest. It’s 1916, and you’re a guest at Vizcaya, industrialist John Deering’s palatial winter home, nestled in the heart of Miami. Your smile widens as you absorb the romance of the Italian architecture, tiptoe through the mystery of the garden maze, and soak in the texture of the lush tropical landscaping. Let yourself giggle as you peek into the fountains, grin at the statues, and gawk at the orchids in the David A. Klein Orchidarium. If these are the things you crave in your memories and your photos, Miami’s Vizcaya Museum is the place to schedule your photo shoot.
Perhaps best known for Walt Disney’s Cinderella Castle in Orlando, Universal Studio’s Hogwart's Castle, and Ripley’s Moorish style Warden Castle in St. Augustine, Florida lays claim to several less publicized castles built in the Gilded Age by the country’s nouveau riche.
Miami’s Vizcaya Museum and Gardens, for instance, is a National Historic Landmark built by agricultural industrialist James Deering. The Deerings’ winter home built on 180 acres along Biscayne Bay is now a museum on ten acres exhibiting his expansive international art collection spanning 2,000 years as well as his exotic orchid collection.
Modeled after historic Italian manor homes, Vizcaya was intended to look old from the onset and was furnished with antiques combining Italian and French Renaissance design elements. Although it was designed and built as an open-air floor plan exposed to both the sounds and scents of the surrounding natural environment and wildlife, the humid weather and recurring hurricanes have required the enclosure of the courtyard.
The museum is open daily except for Tuesdays, Christmas and Thanksgiving.
Vizcaya Museum and Gardens was highlighted in many a guidebooks and the name just kept creeping up prior to my inaugural visit to Miami late spring of this year. Miami represents an aspirational/affluent glamorous beach lifestyle, conjuring words such as 'Miami high-life', 'Miami glam' etc and of as it is the home of house music it is certainly a place to party 'Miami-style'. Ocean, Collins and all the art deco combined could does not prepare you for the 'jewel' of Miami Dade that is Villa Vizcaya.
I arrived rather un-glamorously via a bus and two trains and a short work from the station through an average neighborhood leads to the grounds of the villa. The entrance of Villa Vizcaya is rather modest (but this becomes apparent later) and one is led through into what would have been the courtyard of this winter Venetian wonderland ( James Deering only resided here in winter months). As soon as one steps into the villa, you forget you are in fact in Miami and it suddenly feels like you are in Venice's golden hour of yester years. What is truly enchanting about Vizcaya, is it's bay front location and this view from the main entertaining rooms of the house are to die for. Vizcaya is truly an oasis in the heart of Miami, with no expense spared by its wealthy creator with its magnificently landscaped gardens, which literally take your breath away.
I recommend taking a trip to this enchanting museum and gardens before making way to Little Havana for an authentic Cuban experience. All of these within reasonable distance from all the glitz and glamour SoBe/Coconut Grove offer and the rest of Miami offer. A crossing of parallels as it were of modern day Miami.
The Vizcaya Museum is easily accessible by Metrorail, close to Coconut Grove and Coral Gables. I was eager to see this historic estate as my father had described trespassing onto the property to gawk at its neo-Mediterranean excess during a postwar road trip. Now a museum run by Miami-Dade County, every surface is covered with all the art and architectural decoration that industrial magnate James Deering’s money could buy. In the gift shop, I was pleased to find an affordable book of photos to bring home to Dad. Don’t forget to walk the grounds and see the outdoor statuary. You’ll also see many young women having their Quinceañera (fifteenth-birthday) portraits taken, a Latin American tradition.
Grab your favorite photographer, toe off your shoes and slip through time into a lush subtropical forest. It’s 1916, and you’re a guest at Vizcaya, industrialist John Deering’s palatial winter home, nestled in the heart of Miami. Your smile widens as you absorb the romance of the Italian architecture, tiptoe through the mystery of the garden maze, and soak in the texture of the lush tropical landscaping. Let yourself giggle as you peek into the fountains, grin at the statues, and gawk at the orchids in the David A. Klein Orchidarium. If these are the things you crave in your memories and your photos, Miami’s Vizcaya Museum is the place to schedule your photo shoot.
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