Location: 1685 Collins Ave., Miami Beach | View on Google Maps
Rates: From $734
One of Miami Beach’s most recognizable hotels has reopened after a six-year renovation. Long a gathering place for both locals and visitors, the Delano Miami Beach returns to Collins Avenue with new restaurants, redesigned rooms, a spa, and a members club. Now part of the Ennismore and Accor portfolio, the beachfront resort restores many of its most defining elements while repositioning itself for a different era of South Beach.
The reopening comes as several legacy properties along the main strip of Collins Avenue prepare to return in the coming years.
“[The Delano is] an iconic property, and any time you’re able to bring that back to the neighborhood, bring it on,” says James D’Agostino, the general manager of South Beach’s Gale Miami Hotel & Residences. “You look around South Beach and start to see this as the first rebirth, with the Shore Club and Raleigh reopening next, and it’s bringing this city back to its heyday.”
A landmark reopens
Guest rooms are sanctuaries, while public areas are a longtime gathering spot for locals.
Photo by Fernando Marroquin
Originally opened in 1947 and later reimagined by Philippe Starck in the 1990s, the Delano helped define South Beach’s modern hotel scene. Because the building has historic designation, the latest renovation preserves key architectural elements, including the columned entrance, draped white fabrics, terrazzo floors, the Rose Bar with its quartz-topped counter, and a white, infinity-edged swimming pool.
Many locals see the hotel as a center of the neighborhood’s social life. “It was always a posh, cool place where you could bring anybody and have an amazing time,” says Matt Ragland, a longtime South Beach bartender who met his wife at the Delano’s pool bar. “It was an accessible, beautiful place where you could kick off a night or end your day there. Things just came together there in a way that didn’t happen anywhere else.”
He recalls stepping out of the Florida Room nightclub one night to find Brandon Flowers of the Killers playing an impromptu piano set.
The new Delano has a more subdued vibe that reflects South Beach today. The 171 guest rooms, including a new penthouse suite and poolside bungalows, have been redone in a lighter, beach-inspired palette; suites come with deep soaking tubs.
A new dining lineup built for both visitors and locals
Gigi Rigolatto serves a menu of Italian-inspired dishes.
Rendering courtesy of Delano Miami Beach
The Delano’s food and beverage options are central to the revitalized hotel. Several venues are open to the public and operated by Paris Society, the Paris-based hospitality group known for creating atmospheric gathering spaces in hotels and restaurants.
The largest addition, Gigi Rigolatto, replaces the Delano Beach Bar, a longtime local fixture. The new restaurant serves coastal Italian dishes across indoor dining rooms, a terrace, and poolside seating near the boardwalk, with shareable plates like beef carpaccio and lobster linguini. It’s meant to invoke the feel of European beach clubs, minus the table dancing and high-volume DJs, and is positioned as a destination for happy hours, after-dinner drinks, and balmy beachside dates, the kind of mix that has drawn Miamians for the past 15 years.
“You could sit at the Rose Bar and have one vibe, or you could go to the beach bar and have a completely different one, depending on whether you were still in shorts from the beach or wanted to have a drink before dinner,” Ragland recalls.
A second dining room, Mimi Kakushi, marks the first U.S. outpost of the Dubai-based modern Japanese restaurant. Inspired by 1920s Osaka, it features an art deco–influenced dining room, an open sushi counter, and a menu that includes Kagoshima wagyu and Donabe rice. The cocktail program is inspired by Japanese silent film star Sessue Hayakawa, and each drink pays tribute to one of his roles. The Nara Nara, for example, is a gin martini served inside a block of ice, a nod to his role as a spy in 1917’s A Secret Game.
Mimi Kakushi is open only to hotel guests and members of the new Delano Members Club. Located on the fourth floor, the club offers a private pool, fitness space, and access to the hotel’s Source by Delano spa, along with such programming as culinary events and gallery visits. Membership also includes an annual two-night stay and select room perks.
