What are the strangest Miami landmarks? Take a look at these during your travels

Miami Herald Archives
·4 min read

New York has the Statue of Liberty. St. Louis has the Arch. Seattle has the Space Needle.

What does South Florida have?

What about about a giant pegasus slaying a dragon? A 36-story guitar-shaped hotel? Or a car stuck to the front of a building?

Some of our landmarks are strange. And some are bold. Just like the city.

Here’s a look at some of them:

GUITAR HOTEL

The Guitar Hotel and pool at Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, near Hollywood.
The Guitar Hotel and pool at Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, near Hollywood.

The Seminole Hard Rock’s Guitar Hotel, on State Road 7 between Stirling and Griffin roads near Hollywood, just north of Miami-Dade County, is quite the sight. If you’re lost in the area, it’s a beacon, with light and laser shows shooting across the building every night. Inside are restaurants, casinos and a concert venue.

MORE: What to know about the Hard Rock guitar hotel

PEGASUS

This 110-foot statue in Hallandale cost $30 million. And it’s worth every penny.
This 110-foot statue in Hallandale cost $30 million. And it’s worth every penny.

A larger-than-life statue of a winged horse fighting a dragon is at the entrance of Gulfstream Village, a casino, horse track and shopping-restaurant complex on U.S. 1 in Hallandale Beach, just north of the Aventura Mall in Miami-Dade. The $30 million, 110-foot Pegasus arrived in South Florida in pieces from China and Germany and assembled on site in 2014.

MORE: What to know about the Pegasus

STADIUM SCULPTURE

Homer, the county-owned “home run sculpture” championed by former owner Jefrey Loria and dismantled by new owner Derek Jeter, is nearly assembled in its new home outside Marlins Park.
Homer, the county-owned “home run sculpture” championed by former owner Jefrey Loria and dismantled by new owner Derek Jeter, is nearly assembled in its new home outside Marlins Park.

A spinning symbol of the topics once stood inside the stadium where the Miami Marlins play baseball. When the team hit a homer, the thing would go off. New owners moved “Homer” the statue outside loanDepot Park in Little Havana, where it is still displayed.

MORE: The moving of the baseball sculpture

STILTSVILLE

Welcome to a water world of homes. These wooden party places grace the bay, with stilts planted in the bottom. But Stiltsville isn’t what it used to be. Some of the homes were destroyed by storms and fire. Still, homes in the middle of the water is an only-in-Miami sight.

MORE: The rise, fall and future of Stiltsville

CAR ON A BUILDING

In 2004, a police car hanging from the side of the old Police Museum on Biscayne Boulevard is prepared to be transformed into a rescue vehicle for a new medical complex in the building.
In 2004, a police car hanging from the side of the old Police Museum on Biscayne Boulevard is prepared to be transformed into a rescue vehicle for a new medical complex in the building.

A double take is guaranteed when you pass an office building on Biscayne Boulevard on the way to downtown Miami. It’s a full-size car on the side of the tower. It goes back to 1983 when a Plymouth, donated by the Sweetwater Police Department, was hung on the building, then a police museum. But when that car started rusting, it was taken down, and a police cruiser donated by GM in 1995 went up in its place. It took eight hours to attach the cruiser to the three-story building on 38th and Biscayne. In 2002, the police museum moved to a new home in Titusville, leaving the cruiser behind. But wall-climbing car was just too good to lose, and it was kept when the building became a medical center.

MORE: How’d a car end up on the side of a Miami office building?

FREEDOM TOWER AND THE BILTMORE

Freedom Tower in downtown Miami.
Freedom Tower in downtown Miami.

Miami is full of glass towers these days. But two buildings with Spanish design influence stand out from the crowd and stand out in the skyline: the Freedom Tower in downtown Miami and the Biltmore hotel in Coral Gables.

MORE: Miami’s cherished, historic Freedom Tower shut down for a $25 million restoration

MORE: The Biltmore Hotel is transforming for the 21st century. You won’t recognize the rooms.

BIG ORANGE

Miami’s Big Orange appears duering the New Year’s countdown.
Miami’s Big Orange appears duering the New Year’s countdown.

You can only see this once a year, when the neon image of a giant orange face climbs up the Hotel Intercontinental in downtown Miami for the New Year’s countdown.

MIAMI MARINE STADIUM

Miami Marine Stadium on Virginia Key.
Miami Marine Stadium on Virginia Key.

Imagine a stadium on Biscayne Bay to watch boat racing and concerts. This venue, along the Rickenbacker Causeway on the way to Key Biscayne, is a striking sight. But it’s now abandoned and awaiting repair.

MORE: Miami Marine Stadium makes the national historic honor roll

VIZCAYA

Aerial photo of Vizcaya.
Aerial photo of Vizcaya.
Vizcaya Museums and Gardens is a bayfront property that sits about four feet above sea level. Pieces of the stone and concrete barge in front of the property were swept into Biscayne Bay during Hurricane Irma in 2017. The barge has since been restored to its historical state.
Vizcaya Museums and Gardens is a bayfront property that sits about four feet above sea level. Pieces of the stone and concrete barge in front of the property were swept into Biscayne Bay during Hurricane Irma in 2017. The barge has since been restored to its historical state.

What’s an Italian mansion with an ornate dock doing on the edge of downtown Miami? It’s Vizcaya. former home to an industrialist, and now a county museum. Before Disney World, it was one of the hot attractions in Miami, advertised in all the Miami Beach hotels.

MORE: To preserve grand past, Vizcaya ramps up for a growing risk to Miami’s future: Climate change

WYNWOOD WALLS

A visitor snaps a photo at the Kenny Scharf mural at the Wynwood Walls entrance.
A visitor snaps a photo at the Kenny Scharf mural at the Wynwood Walls entrance.

Painting on a wall? It’s not graffiti — it’s art. In 2009, developer Tony Goldman, who revived New York’s Soho and South Beach, saw an opportunity to create a canvas for street art. Goldman helped create Wynwood Walls by using beat-up warehouse walls that became home for mural masterpieces. Wynwood Walls opened in December 2009.

MORE: Everything you never knew about Wynwood

ROBERT IS HERE

Robert Is Here, 19200 SW 344th St. in the Redland and Homestead areas, has fresh fruits, milkshakes and dozens of flavors of honey.
Robert Is Here, 19200 SW 344th St. in the Redland and Homestead areas, has fresh fruits, milkshakes and dozens of flavors of honey.
Robert is Here fruit stand.
Robert is Here fruit stand.

Robert, as in namesake owner Robert Moehling, was there when the Redland fruit stand opened in 1960. He was 7 at the time. Robert was there for the stand’s 50th anniversary in 2010. And Robert is still there today, selling the stand’s famous shakes and tropical produce. You know you’re at Robert is Here when you see the landmark sign on the stand that says: “Robert is Here.”

MORE: Robert is Here is still packing in people for shakes, fruits and baked goods