Vizcaya Museum and Gardens

Homestalgia Archive

Community memory · 1922–today · Aug 7, 2026

Verified

James Deering, of International Harvester money, built Vizcaya between 1914 and 1922 as a winter house and imagined a fictional history for it, so the rooms are deliberately in different periods, furnished with imported European antiques and architectural elements. Construction employed over a thousand people, roughly a tenth of Miami's population at the time. The stone barge in the bay incorporates reinforced concrete and limestone and was designed to serve as a breakwater as well as a decorative feature. The 1926 hurricane and later storms have battered the gardens repeatedly.

Source: Vizcaya Museum and Gardens, official estate history and collection interpretation; Vizcaya Museum and Gardens, official Stone Barge interpretation and conservation accounts; Vizcaya Museum and Gardens, official hurricane history and visitor address information