If former Miami Beach vice mayor Robert Turchin had been a Miami decision maker during the recent vote that decided the fate of The Miami Herald building, he would probably have voted with the ‘nays’ allowing its demolition.
“There’s nothing special about it,” says the 90-year-old Turchin as he cruises Collins Avenue between 63rd and 48th streets, a strip dense with buildings from the same period as the Herald’s — specimens of post-war Miami Modern (MiMo) architecture that he constructed.
It is no exaggeration to say that Turchin built much of post-war Miami Beach, collaborating with Melvin Grossman, Morris Lapidus and other MiMo period architects. From 1945 to 1985, his firm was the busiest in the building trade. Royal York, Montmartre, Moulin Rouge, King Cole, Charter Club, Four Ambassadors — the list goes on, numbering upward of 100 buildings.
“I grew up when Miami Beach was a small town. It was 1945, and the hotels would close during the summer for renovations because they had no air conditioning. I couldn’t wait for summers, when I would return from school and work on the construction sites,” Turchin says.
In an era when hotel signs sometimes read “No Jews or dogs,” Turchin’s father was a successful builder who hoped his son would be a diplomat. It was not to be. After serving in World War II, for which he recently received a French Legion of Honor medal, he started his first project. Like subsequent ones, it broke the mold.
“The GI Bill made housing affordable for veterans, but it was single-family housing. I wanted to build a four-family unit under the bill,” Turchin says. It was an unprecedented proposal that went from city to state to federal agencies before it was approved. The multi-unit buildings launched the concept of condominiums.
As did other builders, he began to experiment with air conditioning. “Once we were able to air condition them, the hotels stayed open year-round. The beach boomed then,” he says.
Buildings came down to make way for new ones. Turchin’s Morton Towers went up where Carl Fisher’s circa 1920 Flamingo Hotel stood on 15 acres. “The land had become more valuable than the building,” he explains.
Turchin became known as “the builder’s builder” for riding to the top floor of construction sites on the hook of a crane, and walking the beams to inspect the work. His view of the built landscape was daring, pragmatic, and often at odds with those of preservationists like Nancy Liebman, a Miami Beach city commissioner from 1993 to 2001 who served with Turchin on the city’s first historic preservation board.
“A lot of the beautiful mansions on the bay and beach were lost to that kind of development,” laments Liebman. “It was the typical mentality of throw it away and build something new.”
But Turchin was building for the next generation. To him, the Art Deco buildings of his father’s generation — Edgewater Beach, the Sands and the Sea Isle where he honeymooned with his wife — were old school.
“They made no sense. They were all building with a few trees in front. They weren’t called Deco back then. Curlicues on concrete is how we thought of them,” he says.
As the Miami Design Preservation League’s executive director in the early ’80s, Liebman fought to resurrect the Deco constructions. “They were the first generation built to capture the sea breezes, with light and porches. You have to anchor the city with its history and its past through the built environment,” she says.
But zoning had as much to do with how the Deco buildings looked as the architecture did, Turchin says. “When I was starting out, the zoning on the beach was 14 stories maximum, so builders would fill up bigger parcels to the edge of the property line. Land was cheap then, so they could. I kept saying ‘Go up. Go higher.’ You had more options then to put in nice landscaping, underground parking and other amenities,” he says.
While Liebman and others viewed the skyline of the 1960s and 1970s as a “concrete canyon,” the rising structures offered new opportunities for dining and nightlife that held an irresistible attraction for the post-war affluent. Miami Beach garnered a reputation for celebrity hot spots like the Montmartre, with its Les Girls Supper Club and Bardot Bar, one of many Turchin collaborations with Melvin Grossman.
If he demolished some buildings, Turchin has also seen his creations become tear-downs. In 1981 the Montmartre was leveled. On the strip south of 163rd Street, two condominiums replaced the circa 1957 Castaways that housed the famed Wreck Bar under its fanciful roof. A 46-story tower stands where he built the three-story Mozart. Many more of his buildings are in their second or third generation of redevelopment.
Liebman, now president of the MiMo Biscayne Association, works to preserve Biscayne Boulevard as the historic entryway to Miami, so that MiMo buildings like the Turchin-built 1961 King Cole Condominium at 900 Bay Dr. continue to stand. “As a matter of fact, I live in one of Mr. Turchin’s buildings on Belle Isle,” she says. “It’s well-built, has aesthetic appeal, and the amenities are lovely.”
The analysts see opportunity associated with AIG shares linked to the company’s capacity to improve its property-casualty results. These efforts include re-underwriting, re-pricing, re-tooling claims administration and reallocating capital to consumer lines. Over time, they expect AIG to be successful in these endavors, but they are not projecting a substantial P&C improvement over the next year.
Additionally, AIG has made clear that its near-term focus for capital management involves improving the company’s interest coverage ratio. They expect this focus to come at the expense of share repurchase, a considerable source of shareholder value creation in 2012. While AIG sold its remaining stake in AIA in December, the analysts expect that much of these proceeds will be used to repurchase or retire outstanding debt in an effort to lower the interest coverage ratio.
The mosaic was designed by the POP team which is comprised of 10 students from Edsel Ford High School, Dearborn High School and Fordson High School. They have been working with Sample and co-instructor Mohamad Bazzi since September to design the mural and tiles in various patterns, sizes, and colors for the rail station wall.
Workshop participants will attend a brief presentation about the creative process used to design the mosaic tile wall. POP team members will demonstrate the mold process and assist participants in making a tile or two. Approximately 1,000 tiles will be needed to complete the mural.
“When determining the theme and tile designs for the mosaic, the POP team carefully considered that the station is going to be a transportation gateway, welcoming visitors from near and far when they come to visit Dearborn and The Henry Ford,” Bazzi said.
Motion, energy, the historic significance of The Henry Ford just on the other side of the tracks from the new rail station, and the impact that the station will have on the future of Dearborn were all elements the students discussed as they collaborated to design the mosaic mural.
To make the tile molds, the POP students applied wood, plastic and clay to make a relief of each tile design on medium density fiberboard. Then the team went to TechShop in Allen Park where they learned how to use a VacuForm machine to heat and stretch a sheet plastic onto each relief to create the molds that will be used in making the tiles on Jan. 19 and Feb. 2. The clay tiles will be glazed and fired in HFCC Art Department kilns before being installed at the rail station in late 2013.
The POP project, an acronym for Pockets of Perception - We Are One Community, focuses on young people, encouraging multicultural understanding while cultivating their creativity and investment in the community through the creation of public art. The POP project is an initiative of the Dearborn Community Fund as it supports arts, cultural and recreational programs that enrich the Dearborn community.
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