Coconut Grove is the oldest continuously inhabited neighborhood of Miami in Miami-Dade County in Florida. The neighborhood is roughly bound by North Prospect Drive to the south, LeJeune Road to the west, South Dixie Highway (US 1) and Rickenbacker Causeway to the north, and Biscayne Bay to the east. It is south of the neighborhoods of Brickell and The Roads and east of Coral Gables. The neighborhood’s name has been sometimes spelled “Cocoanut Grove” but the definitive spelling “Coconut Grove” was established when the city was incorporated in 1919. What is today referred to as Coconut Grove was formed in 1925 when the city of Miami annexed two areas of about equal size, the city of Coconut Grove and most of the town of Silver Bluff. The area is often referred to as “The Grove” and many locals take pride that Coconut Grove is one of the greenest areas of Miami. Coconut Grove is directly served by the Miami Metrorail at Coconut Grove and Douglas Road stations. Coconut Grove was long known as Miami’s art and artist district.
Several waves of immigration established Coconut Grove, the first in 1825, when the Cape Florida lighthouse went into operation and was manned by John Dubose. Dr. Horace P. Porter is credited for coming up with the name when in 1873 he rented a home from Edmond D. Beasley’s widow, who homesteaded 160 acres of bay front property. He lived there for only a year but during that time he established a post office which he named Coconut Grove. Around the same time the area saw an influx of Americans from the Northeastern US, as well as British and white Bahamian immigrants. The first hotel on the South Florida mainland was located in Coconut Grove. Called the Bay View Inn (later known as the Peacock Inn), it was built in 1882, on the site of present-day Peacock Park, by English immigrants Isabella and Charles Peacock, who had been the owner of a wholesale meat business in London. Coconut Grove’s first black settlement, in the 1880s, was established by Bahamian laborers who worked at the Peacock Inn. The Barnacle Historic State Park is the oldest house in Miami-Dade County still standing in its original location. It was built in 1891 and was home to Ralph Middleton Munroe, also known as “The Commodore” for being the first commodore and founder of the Biscayne Bay Yacht Club, an American yacht designer and early resident of Coconut Grove. The Grove houses a number of buildings, listed in the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP). Among them are the Plymouth Congregational Church and the Villa Vizcaya, built in the Spanish Colonial Revival Style. Miami-Dade County now owns the Vizcaya property, as the Vizcaya Museum and Gardens, which is open to the public.
Coconut Grove has a number of outdoor festivals and events, the most prominent of which is the annual Coconut Grove Arts Festival. thers include the King Mango Strut, which began as a parody of the Orange Bowl Parade, and which continues each year on the last Sunday in December. The Great Taste of the Grove Food & Wine Festival takes place each April. Each June, the Goombay Festival transforms Grand Avenue in Coconut Grove into a Carnaval (Caribbean Carnival), celebrating Bahamian culture, with Bahamian food and Caribbean music (Junkanoo). The Grove has numerous restaurants, open air and streetside cafes, and several waterfront restaurants and bars. By night, the Grove becomes a center of nightlife frequented by locals, young professionals, students from the-nearby University of Miami and Florida International University, and tourists.
Shopping is abundant in the Grove, with two open-air malls, CocoWalk, the Mayfair in the Grove, and many other street shops and boutiques. The Village Center, the three blocks radiating from and focusing on the intersection of Main, McFarland, and Grand Avenues, home to the majority of the retail and restaurant business in the Grove, is also home to three gyms, a multiplex movie house in CocoWalk, several parking garages, a state historic site, an elementary school, a City of Miami fire station, several large condos and residential rental towers, the Coconut Grove Post Office, and two sizable parks. Development and redevelopment continue to redefine and transform the area. Major corporations including Arquitectonica, Spanish Broadcasting System, and Watsco are located in the Grove. The eastern border of Coconut Grove is Biscayne Bay, which lends itself to the local boating and sailing communities. The area features the Coconut Grove Sailing Club, Coral Reef Yacht Club, and a sizable municipal marina, Dinner Key Marina. The US Sailing Center is on the Bay between Kennedy Park and the Coral Reef Yacht Club. Pan Am‘s seaplane operations were based at Dinner Key, and the Miami City Hall is based in the old Pan Am terminal building.
