Faena Miami Beach, And The Case For Too Much
The argument against restraint.
Everything I have written in this series so far has argued for restraint. Stand back, take away, let the landscape do the heavy lifting. I still stand by that.
Faena Miami Beach is the argument against.
It does something almost nothing else in the world does — it gives you unadulterated permission.
At A Glance
The Facts
It sits at 3201 Collins Avenue, on an eight-block stretch of Miami Beach that Alan Faena converted into a district, rather than a hotel. The building was the Saxony, which opened in 1947, and spent the fifties and sixties as the Queen of Collins Avenue, before doing what grand hotels do when the fashionistas move on.
It reopened as Faena Miami Beach in December 2015 and we are SO lucky that it did. A hundred and seventy-nine rooms across twenty-one categories, which tells you something on its own; nobody builds twenty-one categories unless they are genuinely uninterested in uniformity; architects after my own heart.
Baz Luhrmann and Catherine Martin were creative consultants on the interiors. You can feel their magnificence in about four seconds. This is a hotel designed by people whose longing is making an audience feel something on cue, and it shows in a way I find completely disarming.
Los Fuegos by Francis Mallmann is here, all open fire and Argentine asado, seating 188. There is Pao by Paul Qui, El Secreto for omakase, the Veranda, the Saxony Bar, the Living Room, the Tree of Life. Tierra Santa Healing House runs to twenty-two thousand square feet. And then the Faena Theater, and the Forum across the road. You are spoilt for choice.
Permission Is A Design Material
Most venues quietly tell your guests how to behave. A panelled dining room says keep your voice down. A white marquee says this will be pleasant and you will be home by midnight. You can fight the message, but you are fighting the building, and the building has been saying it for longer than you have.
Faena Miami Beach says the opposite thing, loudly, before anyone has taken a drink. Red, gold, murals, that are unapologetically theatrical. It is the architectural equivalent of somebody turning the music up as you walk in. This place meets you and says “yes, you have arrived and the stage is yours.”
That is worth more than it sounds. Half of what a designer is doing at the front of an evening is giving four hundred strangers a reason to stop behaving like people who arrived separately. Normally you have to build that. Here it is already in the walls, and it means your budget goes somewhere else entirely.
It’s like falling down the Rabbit Hole and passing by a tunnel of exquisite objet d’art perfectly placed for your exploration, whilst you’re handed champagne to sip from tea cups. All you’d need do is revel in the glory of your surroundings and the euphoric sense of wonderland.
What I Would Actually Do With It
The temptation at Faena Miami Beach is to add. That is the trap, which could be costly.
If the building is already at nine, everything you bring in has to match or it looks apologetic. Half-committing to a room like this is the single most expensive mistake available, because a scheme that would look generous in a white space reads as thin against gold. Sometimes being present is just enough.
So, the discipline is not restraint. It is nerve, and this nerve will serve you well (trust me). Commit fully or leave it alone and spend the money on people — on talented performers, on concierge, on the thing guests will remember.
If you’re planning an evening experience, The Cathedral is the perfect choice. Then continue exploring. Faena Miami Beach’s real gift is that you have multiple choices and an evening can span across different worlds without the need for transfers: the theatricality of the Cathedral, then fire and smoke at Los Fuegos, then out to the sand. What bliss!
That last move is the one I would not miss. Miami’s evening light does the same thing the desert does, on a shorter fuse and with more humidity. Get people outside for it. Nobody wants to photograph a ballroom.
Who It Is For
A brand with something to celebrate rather than something to explain. An anniversary, a launch, a party that is genuinely meant to be a party. I’d say if you’re looking for serious vibes this isn’t the place for you.
Nervousness reads as a bad fit here, in the way an understated dress reads as a mistake at a costume ball. That is not the hotel’s fault. It is simply what it is for. This hotel embraces the bold, confident and it’s unashamedly proud of its character.
But for a client who arrives wanting the night to be bigger than the year they have had, I struggle to think of anywhere better.
Spend less on making the room extraordinary. It already is. Spend it on what happens in it.
Earlier in the seriesAmangiri, And The Discipline Of Standing Back
All photography credited to Faena Miami Beach, used with permission. This piece is unsponsored and no fee or hosting was received.
