Miami Colonial Hotel

Originally the Watson Hotel, acquired and renamed to the Miami Colonial in 1930, and, after several different name changes, is now the YVE Hotel at 146 Biscayne Boulevard in downtown Miami, Florida.

Cover: Watson Hotel from Bayfront Park in 1926

Only a few of the buildings constructed during the great boom of the 1920s remain as part of today’s skyline. In addition to a court house, several office buildings and a theater, the boom provided three iconic hotels along Biscayne Boulevard which comprised Miami’s first skyline. The Columbus, Everglades and Watson were all built during this era. Having been constructed in 1917, the McAllister Hotel preceded the boom by a few years.

However, only the Watson Hotel remains standing to this day. While it has had a long history of financial troubles, a few controversies, and a lot of name changes, the hotel has demonstrated resiliency from its inception. While most long time residents remember the building as the Miami Colonial Hotel, YVE is the latest brand operating there today. This is the story of the people and events that have shaped more than ninety years of history along Biscayne Boulevard.

Callie Watson & Strand Hotel

Figure 1: Strand Hotel postcard

By the early 1920s, the city of Miami was growing well beyond its accommodations. It was common for hotel operators from other parts of the country to see this problem as an opportunity. When a widow from upstate New York saw an ad to purchase the lease of a hotel in Miami, she decided to take a chance on a young city far from her home.

Callie H. Watson and her son were running the Watson Hotel in upstate New York when they assumed the final three years of the lease for the Strand Hotel in 1922. The Strand was located at 226 N.E. Second Street, which is now the location of a Metro Mover Station in downtown Miami.

The Strand Hotel was built in 1919 by George A. Persch of Philadelphia. It was five stories in height and contained 68 rooms. The Watsons purchased the remaining term of the lease from John S. Giannone, who placed it on the market because of health issues.

Watsons Purchase Lot to Build New Hotel

Callie and her son operated both their namesake hotel in Niagra Falls and the Strand Hotel in Miami while searching for property to build a much grander hotel. As the 1920s progressed, so did construction activity. Miami was experiencing a great real estate boom by the mid-1920s.

The boom hit its peak beginning in 1925. In February of that year, the Watsons found a corner lot that was perfect for their next project. The lot was located a block and a half east of the Strand Hotel, on the corner of North Bayshore Drive and N.E. Second Street. In the summer of the next year, North Bayshore Drive was renamed to Biscayne Boulevard.

In a Miami News article entitled “Early Days in City Recalled”, published in 1931, Bobo Dean wrote that the lot purchased by the Watsons for their hotel was once an empty lot used as a playground by children of early pioneers who lived along the bay at the beginning of the twentieth century. There was a dock that jetted out from the property before fill extended the shore line east to accommodate Biscayne Boulevard and Bayfront Park.

The Watsons got approval to erect a fifteen-story hotel with accommodations for up to two hundred rooms. The estimated cost for the project was $1 million. Following the approval of the plans by the Miami City Commission, construction began in the summer of 1925.

Construction and Opening of the Watson Hotel

Figure 2: Watson Hotel foundation in 1925

The architectural plans were drafted by George E.T. Wells and G. Lloyd Preacher of Atlanta, Georgia. The project was financed by Northern Capital and the general contractor was Realty Construction Company.

By July, the construction of the foundation was underway. The contractor described laying out the foundation as one of the more difficult tasks of the project. The immense pilings had to be driven deep into poured concrete and spaced close together to ensure the long-term stability of the building.