Brickell and the Miami River

Michael Stern’s JDS Development Group is the developer of 888 Brickell, which reaches 1,049 feet over 90 stories and whose architecture is by Studio Sofield and whose interiors are by Dolce&Gabbana, and this cluster covers the Miami neighborhood whose name the building borrows. Brickell sits on the south side of the Miami River where it meets Biscayne Bay.

The Brickell name predates the incorporated city. In 1871, two decades before Julia Tuttle moved south, William and Mary Brickell were already homesteading on the river, and a WLRN report carried by WJCT describes the trading post and post office they kept on its south bank and asks whether Mary deserves a share of the title of mother of Miami.¹

The river itself has been rebuilt as public ground. At the end of 2004 the city prepared to begin a waterside path on each bank of the river, walkways meant to coexist with the river’s working industry and new commercial building alike, as Miami Today reported.²

The rules for building changed as well. Miami 21 replaced the city’s Euclidean code in May 2010 with rules written around building form; DPZ CoDesign, which drafted it, lists among its provisions required gaps between towers and a stepping down of tall corridor buildings where they meet houses.³

The entries take up each part. Brickell history reads the record of the family and the point where they settled, Brickell Avenue follows the main street, the Miami River covers the water and its uses, and the Miami skyline looks at how the district rose. Branded residences examines a building type now common in the city. The building entries on 888 Brickell and Mercedes-Benz Places Miami sit alongside them.