By the early 1980s, the fragile city was eaten from the inside out: the perfect gateway for South American drugs to make their way towards northern consumers. The only glamour left by the time I moved to the USA in 1989 was a crumbling Art Deco district, an ageing population and Miami Beach’s famous southern tip – by then as crime-ridden a neighbourhood as existed in all of the country. It’s unrecognisable now.
Buildings on South of Fifth Street command the best views and prices in town. Cranes cut the sky and restaurants seem to open weekly. Historically a boom-and-bust city, Miami used to lie down and play dead after a crash. But in 2008, it reacted to the financial crisis building new museums, a stadium, the New World Symphony space designed by Frank Gehry and countless office towers.
