Mar 08 2010
Miami Adult Entertainment: Once a Beauty, Always a Beauty
Working from old pictures and documents, Diaz and Figueroa are painstakingly recreating the heyday of the New Yorker, built in 1953 and designed by vaunted MiMo architect Norman Giller. The original pink-and-green or gray-and-yellow bathroom tiles look like new. A variety of chairs, mirrors, and other reproduction period furniture is sprinkled throughout the rooms, which also boast flat-screen TVs and other contemporary amenities. Plans are under way to reopen a bricked-over office window and entrance door.
Boulevard boosters also hope the restored New Yorker will draw more people to the area and begin to change the stubborn perception that Biscayne Boulevard remains a haven for drugs, crime, and prostitution. “I hope people will come and see it — people who still think the Boulevard is riddled with crime,” says Fran Rollason, president of the MiMo Biscayne Association, whose members include businesses, historical preservationists, and local residents.