Colins Avenue

The Marseilles, Collins Avenue Hotel is a great place to stay located right on the beach in the center of South Beach (SoBe). Here are some little known facts about our location:

Collins Avenue is named after John Collins, a Quaker businessman from New Jersey, who joined a group of investors in the 1880's in a coconut farming venture at the southern end of the island of Miami Beach.

At that time Miami Beach was a virtual island, accessible only by ferry from Miami. In 1912, John Collins decided to building a bridge joining the mainland to Miami Beach. When money ran out before the bridge was finished, Carl Fisher loaned Collins $50,000 to complete the bridge

After the initial boom came the big bust in 1925. The following year a devastating hurricane hit South Florida. It took nearly a decade for Miami Beach to overcome the Depression years. In the mid ‘30 Miami Beach regained its luster with hundreds of new buildings constructed in the new Art Modern style architecture -- or, as we know it today Art Deco!