Bernardo Fort-Brescia: Architect, Tangerine Farmer, Tavern Tastemaker

If there is one person who has their finger on the pulse of this city, this magic, ever-changing city, it is an architect. Better yet, a founding principal of Arquitectonica, the international architecture and urban planning firm founded in 1977 in one of the least developed, original villages in this parts – Coconut Grove.  It has grown to over 500 employees in 11 offices worldwide since then, and Bernardo Fort-Brescia’s awards and accolades have kept rolling in.  Still, he will be the first one to tell you that it is with each new project he faces that his career is rebuilt, just as each new project changes the face of that city.

As our final Tavern Tastemaker, it was fitting that Bernardo was full of surprises. It wasn’t until after their lunch of various fruits de mer that we learned Bernardo knows a thing or two about fruits himself. He is a tangerine farmer in South America and as we discussed the ways that the United States prefers perfectly shaped fruit while Europe prefers blemished, we sipped on the “Sunshine State.” Named for its main squeeze, the sumo tangerine, and rosemary cordial, with sake and Plymouth Gin.   “I like this cocktail because you feel the fruit, but also the pure,” Bernardo added.

We hope you have enjoyed these brunches and lunches with Ocean Drive Magazine Editor in Chief Jared Shapiro, and each of our Tavern Tastemakers. Just as Bernardo’s projects shape his career and a cityscape, we like to think our cocktail hours are an opportunity for people to come together with friends and family for a taste of the tavern and maybe the start of something special. One thing is certain, there is a place at our table for artists, producers, chefs, models, architects, television stars, and you.

 

 

Model Behavior with Some Lobster and a Cherry on Top

Kasey Ashcraft is living the dream. The one on the postcard of Miami Beach. Or maybe she’s on the post card of Miami Beach.  She is nothing short of picture perfect and has had her picture taken on a whole lot of beaches, but still calls ours home. This sun kissed Wilhelmina model turned Miami local is a Tavern Tastemaker and sat down with her friend, Ocean Drive Magazine Editor in Chief Jared Shapiro, and a tasty table of Cypress Tavern brunch dishes to talk about why we all want to live in Miami and how exactly she made that dream come true.  There was lobster, of course, because Kasey is from Maryland and “seafood is a big deal.” We know a thing or two about that!  Watch here.

They toasted with a scotch and prosecco cocktail that Cypress Tavern lead bartender David Ferree created. The “Take Me Out” is Chivas Regal 12 Year with sparkling wine and house brandied cherries. An unlikely combo even for Kasey, she said, “I didn’t think I was going to like it because I don’t like cherries or either of those things. But I love it. I never stay and finish drinks, but I’m finishing it.” Come taste for yourself tonight at our Cypress Tavern cocktail hour from 6-8pm with Amanda Fraga, the Genuine Hospitality Group Beverage Manager and Sommelier as we toast Kasey Ashcraft at the end of another day in the sun.

Emilio Estefan, Cypress Tavern Brunch, and the American Dream

Emilio Estefan will be the first to tell you he is living the American dream, and loving it. He made a name for himself with Miami Sound Machine as a musician, and he has since become a producer shaping the sound of a vast amount of the Latin American music here in America. He came to this country as a teenager from Cuba and has a unique passion to define what the new Latino is in this changing country of ours, and he has proved that he has what it takes to do so. With 19 Grammy’s, TV, Film, a best-selling author credit and his latest venture, the Broadway musical On Your Feet!, all under his belt Emilio has earned his place at our table as a Tavern Tastemaker.

Toast Emilio tonight, with his cocktail at a special price of $10.

In today’s Tavern Tastemakers episode, Ocean Drive Magazine Editor in Chief Jared Shapiro learns just why Emilio loves Miami so much, hint: it’s not just the sports teams. And we learn why it is that Miami loves the Estefans so much, and it’s not just his sense of humor, though it was all smiles as they sat down to brunch at Cypress Tavern. “Remember,” he says, “the more you drink the better you sound.”

Emilio is as much an ambassador of music as he is of Latin America. He is a renaissance man of the entertainment world, and with each piece of work that he puts his stamp upon he is trying to distinguish each unique culture from one another and blend them together at the same time. It is no easy task but as he puts it, “I can say, very respectfully, that I understand both the Latino and Anglo cultures. I know how they feel and what moves them and it is working in that gap that has enabled me to create my body of work.” No where is that job more important than in Miami. But like all things, Miami needs love too, and Emilio has that to provide as well. He speaks kindly of Michael Schwartz and the restaurants saying that “people who love Miami always support people doing things in Miami.” On the brunch food he adds, “the taste is amazing.” He should know, a tried and true Miami restaurant owner himself. Speaking of Miami now he says, “I’m so proud.” And we are too.

Michele Oka Doner: World-Renowned Artist, Native Miamian, Tavern Tastemaker

Miami is a transient place. People come as often as people go. For some, our magic city is just a staging place for a bigger life, for others, arriving in Miami brings the dreams of a new life. For a few of us though, Miami is the magic city where we were born. Michele Oka Doner is one of the latter. Her remarkable talent and awe-inspiring works of art have taken her all over the country and globe, but Michele will always call Miami Beach home. In today’s Tavern Tastemakers episode with Ocean Drive Magazine we get a little bit of insight into what that was like while she cozies up to a lunch at Cypress Tavern with Editor in Chief Jared Shapiro.

Chat Chow’s Gio Gutierrez shooting Jen Massolo as she crafts two drinks for Michele’s episode. Visit her tonight behind the Cypress Bar to enjoy them at a special price of $10.

The beauty of a childhood spent outdoors amidst the flora and fauna of our tropical paradise shaped the artist that Michele has become. One look at any of her pieces is to witness the glory of the natural world in some form. Miami was not just a backdrop though, the social aspect of a budding city was a part of her world as well. As Michele explains in today’s Tavern Tastemakers episode, when approaching how she might design a piece of work for a city, she looks to the locals, the people who her art will impact, and she goes from there. This because she knows something of transience and she knows the gravity of permanence. A Miami native has seen the makeovers and resurgences that a city goes through, and Michele’s gift is taking that experience and reflecting it back. Her art represents the full spectrum of a city, it’s people, and it’s soul.

Her work The River of Quintessence is a mosaic floor of green glass, mother of pearl and seashells that winds through the U.S. Courthouse in Laredo, Texas just as the Rio Grande snakes through the city’s landscape, creating a sense of comfort in a building  that might not always offer much. A Walk On the Beach at the Miami International Airport channels the Miami beaches of years past, that Michele’s young feet walked upon. Some of these creatures can only be witnessed through art anymore, because of people and time and change. But Michele gives these treasures back to us, under our own feet, in beautifully crafted bronze and mother of pearl, for us to continue to explore year after year.

In this way, Michele is a sort of gatekeeper. She gives us back a bit of the past so that, like the ancient trees on Pine Tree Drive that she speaks of, a little more of her Miami Beach can continue to live on. For this, we are lucky to have her, and for this she is a Tavern Tastemaker.

I like a warm lunch, and the Grilled Romaine Salad satisfied both my craving for heat and a desire for greens. Bravo!

A Walk on the Beach Cocktail delivers! Though I was situated a few short miles from the coast, bubbles bursting on my tongue offset by the scent and nip of fresh green mint created a “beach day” moment!

Visit Michele’s latest Miami installation, How I Caught A Swallow in Mid-Air, at Perez Art Museum. Now until September 11, 2016.

Out of Africa and Into Our Genuine Story

Whether chef, photographer, writer or painter, what defines our art is the story we tell with it. If you let them, the flavors on the tables at our restaurants will take you to Homestead, the Gulf, Italy or India, while the art on the walls of our Private Dining Room at Michael’s Genuine Food & Drink, will take you to New York City.

Beth O’Donnel’s The Highline Series tells of the various shades of crazy that one sees on any given day from the High Line, a public park built on a rail line elevated above Manhattan’s West Side, but that’s only the first page.

Through layers of encaustic wax she writes the rest of the story, finishing it with black paint that gets wiped away, leaving markings of depth and texture that she can carve into. Just as her life is her work, and her work is her art and they all merge, Beth fell in love with the idea of merging photography and paint and encaustic wax to create these storyboards. On the northern wall of the PDR is a piece titled Kibera Kids which takes us from Miami to the High Line and then through a window into the slums of Nairobi where a smile shines back at us.

In 1997 Beth traveled to Africa on safari. “I fell in love with it,” she said. She returned in 1998 and then in 1999 she went back again, this time to meet Wangari Maathai, founder of the Green Belt Movement and the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, in order to photograph African women for a book about women making a difference at the grass roots level. Ms. Maathai quickly pointed Beth towards the women still rooted within these African communities. “I was able to get out and go to the University of Kansas and get my degree,” she said, “but there are so many amazing women living there in the slums and they’re the ones that should be getting the attention. They represent the thousands and thousands of women doing that kind of work all over the world.” So she took Beth to them, and that day was when she photographed the faces that brighten Kibera Kids.

“I spent the night in that slum right there,” Beth said pointing to a photo as I flipped through the finished product, Angels in Africa, “as a journalist or photojournalist you have to experience that. I spent months and months and months in that slum and in Kibera, they are the largest slums in the world.”

Now Beth sits on the board of the African Rainforest Conservancy and supports the Tanzania Forest Conservation Group – teaching villagers how to restore the forest, how to plant nurseries, what trees to cut , what trees not to cut so as is quoted by one of the amazing women in the book, “there might one day be trees blanketing these mountains as far as the eye can see.” As there once were. As there should be.

Today, Beth’s first Chelsea Art District gallery show opens at the Birnam Wood/ Galleries. We’re proud to be showing her work, and we’re proud of the work that she does, which is why when Tamara Schwartz suggested her art go up at our flagship we jumped at the opportunity. Just as our chefs use ingredients to create, it is with passion that each expression of Beth’s art comes to be. “Live your dream, don’t dream your life,” she said. “It’s got to be like that.” It really does.