Parking garages aren't usually something you stop and stare at. Whether at the local shopping mall or the airport, the common parking garage is typically nothing more than a commodity – or, an annoyance.
But because Miami does everything extra, the garages around South Beach, Wynwood, and some of the other surrounding areas are unlike your typical, run-of-the-mill parking structures. These sky-scraping concrete blocks and metallic sculptures are actual pieces of art, designed to blend in with the beautiful architecture surrounding them. In some cases, these garages have restaurants, museums, and even mansions on the roof.
So for Miami Art Week, I took a trip down south to see what some of these structures actually look like in person.
1111 Lincoln
The most extravagant garage of all is on Lincoln Road in South Beach. Dubbed 1111 Lincoln, this massive super-structure juts out from the surrounding buildings like a monolith, visible from miles away. It's one of the most popular parking garages in the country – not an extensive list – and a regular event space.
Nissan debuted the then-new Rogue here in 2017, and BMW showed the Concept XM on the seventh floor for the first time. Mazda's online car configurator even used the garage as a backdrop in the past.
The selling point of this super-garage is its minimalist, brutalist styling. Designed by Christine Binswanger of the Herzog & de Meuron firm, it uses triangular pillars propping up each floor, allowing for an open-air design that allows for excellent city views. Upon its completion towards the tail end of 2010, it made the cover of the New York Times for being such an insane-looking thing.
And there's a secret to this garage. Hidden on the top floor is a 5,300-square-foot house formerly owned by the garage's developer, Robert Wennett, that includes a swimming pool and roughly 16,000 square feet worth of landscaped outdoor space. It went up for sale in 2017 with a ridiculous $34-million asking price. Imagine spending $34 million to live on top of a parking garage. That’s Miami for you.
Faena Park
Down the street on Collins Avenue, directly across from Miami Beach, is a relatively new parking garage. The Faena Park structure isn't as imposing as 1111 Lincoln, but it still has its own unique style.
Top to bottom, the 28,000-square-foot concrete facade is lined with circular openings that allow the breeze from the ocean to cycle through the garage, while a glass partition on the side of the building splits the concrete down the middle. It looks fancy, especially for a parking structure.
This garage was designed by Shohei Shigematsu, a partner at the architectural firm OMA. Their resume includes superstructures like Layja in Saudi Arabia, the New Hospital of Cremona in Italy, and Hongik University in Seoul.
Ballet Valet
Head south on Collins Ave and you won't be able to miss the wonderfully named Ballet Valet. The five-story, 206,000 square-foot structure looks like a terrarium on top of a Vans store. It has 650 parking spots hidden behind three types of bushy plants: Clusia Guttifera, Conocarpus Erectus Serecius, and Scaevola Frutescens. It's even home to several native bird species.
They officially call this structure a “vertical green zone,” which cuts through the concrete of South Beach's many high rises. It's won multiple awards from the International Parking Institute, the Urban Land Institute, and others. Who knew parking garages could even win awards?
Arts & Letters Garage
In stark contrast to Ballet Vallet's vertical green space, the Arts & Letters Garage at Collins Park looks like something out of a sci-fi flick. At 15,000 square feet and home to 513 parking spots, the garage has thousands of letters that stretch up and down its massive facade, some of them illuminated.
The structure is LEED at the Gold Level and certified Parksmart, meaning that it's environmentally friendly. It's also one of the biggest garages of the group behind the monolith that is 1111 Lincoln and another superstructure further down on the list. Beyond that, there's a cafe and a small theater at the base of the building.
City View
Tucked away in the posh Design District is the City View garage. This garage was built in 2015 by Dacra, one of the original founding members of the Miami Design District in 2010, and it has three unique visual elements to set it apart from your average garage.
On one end of the garage is a golden wave-like structure created by the firm Leong Leong. On the other end is a silver geometric pattern created by artist IwamotoScott, made entirely of aluminum. Perched between the two is a portrait created by artist John Baldessari that shows three people in a swimming pool. It almost looks like a canvas when you see it from the highway, but it's actually perforated stainless steel with varying oval openings that create the distinctive look.
Museum Garage
One of the most photographed garages – hell, one of the most Instagrammed spots in all of Miami – is the Museum Garage in the Design District. Less than a mile from City View, the Museum Garage is a mish-mash of art styles ranging from ant colony-like textures to full-sized car sculptures (you know, because garage).
Five different designers and artists contributed to the look of this parking structure, which stands seven stories tall and has more than 800 spots. Architect and curator Terence Riley came up with the concept, which now houses a garden, a lending library, a dedicated art space, and an adult-sized playground.
The top floor of the structure is its signature piece. The concrete is awash in pink, yellow, and green, with funky textures and graphics everywhere you look. It's also the best way to access the playground, with a slide on the top floor that takes you down to a ropes course. It truly is one of the weirdest spots in all of Miami, and that's saying a lot.
Wynwood Garage
The Wynwood parking structure on the corner of NW 27th Street in Miami is probably what you'd get if you told Chat GPT to make you a big, scary parking garage. The massive 250,000-square-foot, eight-story tall building juts up from the skyline with an aluminum facade littered with lines that almost look like race tracks (can you spot COTA?).
The garage used to be a clothing factory, but now it has 428 parking spots and around 20,000 square feet of retail and office space on the top and bottom floors. That makes it one of the biggest garages in the entire city, and the first ever in the Wynwood district.
And all of these garages are truly wonderful in their own ways. What could have been cold, lifeless concrete structures add an extra element of vibrance to a city that is all about glitz and glamor. So the next time you find yourself in South Beach or Wynwood, make sure to seek out these strange structures.
Photos: Jeff Perez For Motor1
