52 minute read
The Look
All Tied Up
It’s all about texture and color this summer.
BOTTEGA VENETA
sandal, $1,250, Neiman Marcus ETRO BAG, $1,800, Neiman Marcus
Premier Estate Properties 10
Reasons To Sell and Buy Your Luxury Estate with Geri&Jackie
We are passionately driven to work for our clients. We have over 37 years combined experience representing luxury real estate. We provide our clients with impeccable personalized service with real time market alerts. Our attention to detail in every aspect of the service we provide. We take great pride in building long-term relationships with our clients confirmed by a large percentage of repeat client business. In depth market knowledge bringing buyers and sellers together in a significant number of off-market sales. We are hands-on in every aspect of each transaction. We keep our clients updated on all crucial timelines. We exclusively represent ultra-luxury waterfront, golf, and estate properties in excess of $1 million. Our reputation and clients mean the world to us.
E S T A T E A G E N T S Geri Penniman&Jackie Feldman
561.212.3888 561.400.2156
Premier Estate Properties
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DISCLAIMER: Information published or otherwise provided by Premier Estate Properties, Inc. and its representatives including but not limited to prices, measurements, square footages, lot sizes, calculations and statistics are deemed reliable but are not guaranteed and are subject to errors, omissions or changes without notice. All such information should be independently verified by any prospective purchaser or seller. Parties should perform their own due diligence to verify such information prior to a sale or listing. Premier Estate Properties, Inc. expressly disclaims any warranty or representation regarding such information. Prices published are either list price, sold price, and/or last asking price. Premier Estate Properties, Inc. participates in the Multiple Listing Service and IDX. The properties published as listed and sold are not necessarily exclusive to Premier Estate Properties, Inc. and may be listed or have sold with other members of the Multiple Listing Service. Transactions where Premier Estate Properties, Inc. represented both buyers and sellers are calculated as two sales. Premier Estate Properties, Inc.’s marketplace is all of the following: Vero Beach, Town of Orchid, Indian River Shores, Town of Palm Beach, West Palm Beach, Manalapan Beach, Point Manalapan, Hypoluxo Island, Ocean Ridge, Gulf Stream, Delray Beach, Highland Beach, Boca Raton, East Deerfield Beach, Hillsboro Beach, Hillsboro Shores, East Pompano Beach, Lighthouse Point, Sea Ranch Lakes and Fort Lauderdale. Cooperating Brokers are advised that in the event of a Buyer default, no commission will be paid to a cooperating Broker on the Deposits retained by the Seller. No commissions are paid to any cooperating broker until title passes or upon actual commencement of a lease. Some affiliations may not be applicable to certain geographic areas. If your property is currently listed with another broker, please disregard any solicitation for services. Copyright 2022 Premier Estate Properties, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Photography by Edward Butera, ibi designs, Boca Raton, Florida.
Men (Not) InBlack
This Father’s Day, give him the gift of living color
FROM TOP: BURBERRY sunglasses, $225, Eye Catchers Optique
BLAKE KUWAHARA
sunglasses, $635, Grove Opticians MAYBACH sunglasses, $2,350, Grove Opticians; MCM cross-body bag, $795, Neiman Marcus, Boca VERSACE sneaker, $975, Neiman Marcus, Boca; VERSACE men’s shirt, $1,150, shorts, $925, Neiman Marcus, Boca
VALENTINO Garavani Espadrilles, $890, Neiman Marcus EUGENIA KIM scarf headband, $145, Neiman Marcus
ART.365 MARELLA
striped shirt, $295, Barbara Katz HAPPY SHEEP sweater, $375, Filly & Colt
Rainbow Nation
Brighten things up with the whole color spectrum
JW ANDERSON loafer, $645, Neiman Marcus PAUL TAYLOR sunglasses, $590, Grove Opticians GIGI clutch, $205, BANJANAN top, $185, DL VINTAGE white jeans, $189, all from Barbara Katz Belt, $300, Filly & Colt
Vintage Prints
Some florals bloom with a classic spin
Layering the Links Belts become jewel r y thi s s pri n g — a n d t h e m ore, t he be tter
BRAVE leather with chain, $120, Wish & Shoes; DISMERO green stone belt, $255, and silver belt, $185, St. Emile diamond belt, $295, all from Evelyn Rolleder Boutique
FROM TOP ETNIA BARCELONA,
$325, Eye Catchers Optique JIMMY CHOO, $299, Eye Catchers Optique
OSCAR FRANK,
$249, Eye Catchers Optique
FRANCIS KLEIN,
$590, Grove Opticians
DITA NARCISSUS,
$625, Grove Opticians
Sea Sunnies
Come out of your shell this summer and slip on some sexy shades
Makeup pro Skyler Ruth gives you tips on a new summer beauty approach.
Lighten Up
Summertime means a natural easy look, with lighter makeup and a sunny glow
Written by STAFF
The last cold front swept through South Florida weeks ago, and summer is slowly washing over us with longer days, a brighter sun and a heat index hovering on tropical. It’s time to embrace the new season with lighter, more natural summer looks in both fashion and makeup.
We asked Skyler Ruth, a makeup artist and licensed esthetician at Estetiq International and owner of Sky Cosmetic Creations, to give us a few pointers on how to achieve that easy breezy summer girl look:
1. “Instead of a heavy foundation wear a light tinted moisturizer with sunscreen. You want to be natural (not melted!).” 2. “Instead of a heavy lip, wear a lip tint or a lip gloss. A lip tint gives you a subtle color, almost like you are not wearing anything—and it feels clean and natural.”
3. “Eyebrows are the new lips. You might want to get permanent brows for the summer, so when you hit the pool or the beach you don’t have to worry about your brows. Hybrid brows are a combination of soft hair strokes and shading that gives you a natural-looking eyebrow that will last three years. It’s different from microblading, because it’s not done with a knife; it’s done with a machine.” 4. “An eyelash lift curls and lifts your eyelashes for weeks. Even better is an eyelash lift and tint, which dyes lashes at the same time and lasts for five weeks.”
5. “A pretty highlighter gives you a nice, summery, dewy glow. It can be any color, but it usually depends on your skin undertones; if you have a cool undertone, you’d use something from the pink family, but if you have warm undertones, you’d use a gold or bronzy one.”
To contact Skyler Ruth for that special makeup session (she makes house calls!), or to schedule your permanent makeup appointment, contact skylermruth@gmail. com and via Instagram at designs. by.sky. Or visit Estetiq International Boca Raton, 2800 N. Federal Highway, 561/866-7171. HERE ARE A FEW PRODUCTS WE LOVE THAT WILL BRING OUT THE SUMMER IN EVERYONE.
CHARLOTTE
TILSBURY Beauty Light Wand (Pinkgasm)
ANASTASIA Beverly Hills DIPBROW Waterproof Smudgeproof Brow Pomade
DIOR ADDICT
Lip Tattoo
NARS Radiant Tinted Moisturizer
All available at sephora.com
Coral History
A Boca artist’s “Recycled Reef” brings awareness to our polluted oceans
Written by JOHN THOMASON
[As for] teaching a lesson [with art], I feel like that should come after. It should be something that hits you after you already like it. It’s a subversive way of forcing you to take part in it.”
—Gregory Dirr
Below, “Red Kingdom;” opposite page, Gregory Dirr with “Recycled Reef” From its newly installed position in Boca Raton’s South Beach Park Pavilion, the various tendrils of artist Gregory Dirr’s sculpture “Recycled Reef” snake this way and that. Weighing some 2,000 pounds, it would be an impressive simulation of a coral reef even without the 1,000-plus additions clinging onto its appendages like barnacles: the sunglasses, the calculators, the cassette tapes, the weathered sports trophies.
With this accumulated plastic detritus plastering every inch of the sculpture, “Recycled Reef” becomes something deeper. It’s a monument to our collective waste—a totem to the stuff we throw away but that never goes away. Dirr and his wife, Ashleigh, scavenged many of these discards from Boca beaches.
“Whenever I do stuff like this, I think it’s more about being beautiful and being a good object that people like, and feel proud of, in their community,” says Dirr, 35, from his home in West Boca. “[As for] being preachy and teaching a lesson, I feel like that should come after. It should be something that hits you after you already like it. It’s a subversive way of forcing you to take part in it.
“Because it’s art; if it’s not beautiful and it’s not something cool to look at, then what’s the point, really?”
The City of Boca Raton selected Dirr’s concept after putting out a call to artists to design a public work that integrates recycled material. “Recycled Reef” is not Dirr’s first foray into public art, nor his first deployment of recyclables. He upcycled Plexiglass for “Spirits of South Florida,” an immersive series of sculpted animals threatened by extinction that dotted the grounds of Dreher Park in 2020.
As an accomplished professional artist with a lengthy and eclectic C.V. dating to 2004, Dirr often has several irons in the fire—he’ll juggle commissioned pieces for public and private clients with his own passion project: “The Big Book,” a series of intricate and motley acrylic paintings that comprise a larger narrative, and that will eventually be accompanied by a book. Influenced by vintage American comic books and video games, it follows the adventures of Little Girl and Little Boy as they journey into mystical worlds that evoke both Lewis Carroll and Renaissance art.
“It’s meant for young adults to adults, but I wouldn’t say it’s Harry Potteresque, where there’s adult situations,” Dirr says. “There’s no bad language, people don’t die in it. It’s very existential in the sense of, what’s worse than dying? Or how do you love someone if you can’t have a physical or sexual connection with them? So what is love in that sense?”
Dirr has spent 10 years, on and off, toiling on “The Big Book,” and hopes to one day be awarded a residency where he can devote as much time to the words as he has to the visuals—and then to seek a publisher.
A graduate of Ringling College of Art and Design in Sarasota, Dirr grew up in the same West Boca house in which he lives now; his parents’ sentimental Norman Rockwell scenes, which take up most of a living-room wall, make for a jarring contrast to Dirr’s modernist paintings hanging catty-corner.
He has not held a full-time job since high school, confident that “the jobs will be there.” It has seen him through so far, while continuing to provide ample opportunity for his most personal work, and the universal, democratizing principles of “The Big Book.”
“I try to make everything acceptable to everyone, whether you’re a baby [or] 90 years old,” he says. “If you go to see the Mona Lisa, that affects everyone. ... you get your own interpretation of this thing some guy made so long ago. Art has to be able to do that, or it’s just not really art.”
AARON BRISTOL
—Max Weinberg
Weinberg performing in 2011
From E Street to Delray Beach
Springsteen stickman Max Weinberg is as serious about local zoning as he is about rock drumming
Written by JOHN THOMASON
No matter your generation or demographic, Max Weinberg has been available for your discovery.
For late boomers and early Gen-Xers, it was, and is, his role as drummer for Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band; Weinberg has held the sticks on the Boss’s recording sessions and marathon concerts since 1974. For millennials like myself, it was his time as bandleader for Conan O’Brien’s late-night talk show, beginning in 1993, in which he functioned as the deadpan foil to the host’s offbeat antics.
Real estate buffs may have clued into Weinberg through his serial renovations, which have been featured in the Wall Street Journal. He has flipped 44 houses at the time of this writing.
And as of last year, Delray Beach locals may know him as one of the seven members of the city’s planning and zoning board.
“My avocation, apart from my profession, has been, over the past 40 or so years, buying properties, fixing them up. … These were houses that needed some tender, loving care, and were sold with the idea that you’re going to enjoy living in them,” says Weinberg, 70. “One of the reasons they asked me to put my name in for the planning and zoning board is because I had so much practical experience on the other side of the dais as an applicant.” Weinberg’s relationship to Delray Beach began in 2008, when Springsteen and the E Street Band toured the BB&T Center in Sunrise, and Weinberg chose to stay at the Seagate. Nine years later, Weinberg and his wife, Becky, moved to Delray Beach, after “two extremely bitter, cold winters” in his native New Jersey. “We were drawn into the life of Delray Beach,” he recalls. “As a member of the planning and zoning board, I’ve really delved into the history, and I’m a member of the Historical Society and the Preservation Trust, so I really do know the history here. It’s a lovely place to live. If my children were young, I’d say it was a lovely place to raise a family. Once I started living here, I started getting drawn into trying to help the town.”
Weinberg jumped into these civic duties with both feet, immersing himself in the minutiae of Florida land development regulations and Delray’s comprehensive master plan. He’ll spend days on homework, researching the board’s agenda items for meetings that can last up to six hours. He speaks eloquently and at length about all things building and zoning, an outgrowth of his longtime passion for architecture. To wit: “I think that in certain parts of Delray Beach, a watered-down version of Corbusier’s international style, which was conceived a hundred years ago, is inappropriate for the neighborhood.”
Generally, while he describes his philosophy as “not anti-development at all,” his motto is “preserve the best, and improve the rest. You want to be very, very careful that in getting what you want, you don’t lose what you have—it’s a quote that was attributed to Little Richard, who some say is the architect of rock ‘n’ roll. It’s important that in looking toward the future, you respect the past, you learn from the past, and you honor the past. … If I have a soapbox, that’s the soapbox I get on.”
In addition to his contributions to city planning and historic preservation, Weinberg has also enriched Delray Beach’s cultural venues with his presence, playing venues such as Arts Garage and the Old School Square Pavilion with his current outfit, Max Weinberg’s Jukebox, formed with three versatile musicians from New Jersey. Like the name suggests, the shows are a hodgepodge of material from rock history, with the audience selecting the entire set list each night in real time from a “menu” of some 200 songs. One show from last year, for instance, saw the group segue from AC/DC’s “Highway to Hell” into Tom Petty’s “American Girl” into Chuck Berry’s “Johnny B. Goode.” Weinberg often tells stories from his nearly 60-year career in music between songs.
This sense of unpredictability onstage—of not knowing what the next song in the set list will be— isn’t new for a member of Springsteen’s band. “[Bruce will] turn around in a concert, and pick out a song we haven’t played in 20 years,” Weinberg says. “That’s the unspoken ability of the E Street Band, this ability to have the recall. It’s amazing; under the pressure of 50,000 people out there, you rise to the occasion.
“I’ve always embraced Tom Brady’s saying; he articulated my thoughts perfectly. He said, ‘if you stay ready, you don’t have to get ready.’”
IF YOU GO
WHAT: Max Weinberg’s Jukebox WHERE: Broward Center, 201 S.W. Fifth Ave., Fort Lauderdale WHEN: May 27, 7:30 p.m. COST: $45 CONTACT: 954/462-0222, browardcenter.org
MATT STURGESS
eader in Financial Advice and PlanningL Elizabeth Bennett,
PRINCIPAL AND CEO
CHESAPEAKE FINANCIAL PLANNING & TAX SERVICES
“Women need to be involved in their financial plans and have an understanding of where all of their assets are, and what they are used for,” says Certified Financial Planner™ and Certified Financial Fiduciary Elizabeth Bennett.
As a woman who has reared a child, been through a divorce and is working toward her own financial future, she forges a relationship with her clients from her own personal experiences.
“You need be in control of your finances and not leave that responsibility to someone else,” she cautions. “Knowing the types of investments that you have, the log-ins for your accounts, and sharing that information with your spouse is very important. Being involved in reviews with your financial advisor and understanding how to access those assets is imperative,” Bennett says.
“Taking responsibility for your financial wellbeing, starting at a young age, is probably one of the best things you can do for yourself. You should take advantage of your employer’s retirement plan, understand what your short-term savings need to look like and what your assets’ tax implications are. Be aware of your spending habits and where all of your money is going, whether you are single or married. As women, we know the value of delegating. My advice is to take one thing off of your plate and reach out to an advisor to get your financial house in order with someone you can trust. I am here for you,” she says.
A division of:
561.210.7339
Chesapeake-Financial.com
Written by Marie Speed and John Thomason
These dining destinations have stood the test of time and are a great way to experience real Florida at its classic best
The South Florida dining scene has evolved over the past decades from down-home simple to California cuisine to the Mango Gang to groundbreaking culinary stars and restaurants. James Beard-nominated chefs have come and gone and come back again; Miami spawns a trendy restaurant every six minutes. And through it all, some tried-and-true restaurants mark the passing years and continue to, well, pass the butter. Here are a few South Florida mainstays—some quirky, some old-school—that have stood the test of time.
Cap’s Place
2765 N.E. 28TH COURT, LIGHTHOUSE POINT; 954/941-0418
How long in business: 85+ years
Why we love it: Many restaurants can claim to be “on the water,” but only Cap’s Place requires an exclusive ferry ride to experience it. And it is an only-in-South-Florida experience: You board Cap’s motor launch at the restaurant’s mainland dock by the Lighthouse Point Yacht Basin and Marina and travel 10 minutes, enjoying a guided history of the area by the knowledgeable captain. You disembark on one of the few time-warped islands developers have yet to dig and strip, into an unspoiled world of Florida pine trees and mangroves dating back 80 years. You’ll follow in the footsteps of such notable Cap’s Place diners as the Vanderbilts, the Rockefellers, Al Capone, Casey Stengel, George Harrison, Errol Flynn, Gloria Swanson and Mariah Carey. Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill reportedly spirited away to Cap’s to strategize during World War II. It’s that influential, and that long in the tooth.
Opened in the 1920s, Cap’s claims the mantle of the oldest restaurant in Broward County, and is actually a cluster of five historic buildings—including the restaurant, bar, fish house and boathouse, all of which made the National Register of Historic Places in 1990. Founder Eugene Theodore “Cap” Knight, a seafarer and third-generation son of lighthouse keepers, launched the business as a casino and Prohibition-era speakeasy.
Built with coastal pine and pecky cypress and festooned with collected driftwood, fishnets, harpoons and other maritime detritus, the restaurant still conjures the low-ceilinged ramshackle charm intended by its founders. And, thanks to that exclusive waterfront location, it boasts some of the freshest seafood in town, from bacon-wrapped scallops to fried calamari to a daily catch cooked one of eight different ways. And trust us: After trying the Okeechobee Hearts of Palm Salad, a menu staple since Cap’s opened, you’ll never see a cabbage palm the same way again.
Left, the historic bar; above, the modern Cap’s Place experience
Anthony’s Runway 84, 330 STATE ROAD 84; 954/476-8484 How long in business: 46 years
Why we love it: Airline food may not be synonymous with haute cuisine, but for nearly half a century, this airport-adjacent Italian staple has managed to square that circle—evoking both the golden age of American commercial flight and the rarefied atmosphere of fine dining. In some ways it’s everything you expect from upscale Italian: white tablecloths and crimson chairs, fresh-baked bread and mussels included with every meal, a maître‘d and service staff that treats each diner like family, and whose tenures with the restaurant often exceed 30 years.
But Runway 84 marinates in air-travel kitsch too, like the un-missable jumbo jets painted onto the mirrored walls of the dining room, as if taxiing down a runway straight into your minestrone. In the adjacent bar/lounge, photographs of nocturnal cityscapes shot through airplane windows wrap around the booths; a model Delta airliner hovers over the array of bottles; and vintage maps and luggage tags are embedded into the bar. It’s no surprise Anthony’s Runway 84 is many travelers’ first stop after landing at FLL.
Its clientele is fiercely loyal, and has included dozens of celebrities whose photos line its walls, among them Jake LaMotta, Peyton Manning, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Joe Theismann. Regulars swear by house specialties like the Chicken Rosie (chicken breast stuffed with spinach, prosciutto, mozzarella cheese, capers and olives sautéed in a white wine sauce) and Chicken Scarpariello; in 2019, Miami New Times christened it the Best Restaurant in Fort Lauderdale. Best enjoy the place’s nostalgia while it lasts, however: We heard through the grapevine that the restaurant is planning a major renovation this summer, including a remodeled interior. Of course, like smoking— and legroom—on airplanes, nothing lasts forever.
Sea Watch
Sea Watch on the Ocean,
6002 N. OCEAN BLVD., FORT LAUDERDALE, 954/781-2200
How long it’s been there: 48 years
Why we love it: Everyone knows it’s about impossible to find an oceanfront restaurant in South Florida; most gave way to condo canyons and resorts decades ago. But Sea Watch is still there, updated, perched on a bluff in the dunes with long views of the Atlantic from just about every vantage point in this rambling icon. With post-and-beam design and a nod to its previous nautical décor, Sea Watch has long been a special occasion place, a wedding place, a destination for those out-of-towners on their annual pilgrimage to Fort Lauderdale. The menu has been updated to reflect modern tastes (and we hear the food is at its best these days) with seafood center stage, from baked oysters and crispy calamari to swordfish and mahi, seared scallops and a mean bouillabaisse.
Papa Hughie’s Seafood World,
4602 N. FEDERAL HIGHWAY, LIGHTHOUSE POINT, 954/942-0740
How long it’s been there: 46 years
Why we love it: Joy and Hugh Ganter opened Seafood World in 1976 after several years living in the Bahamas, which helps define its menu and its vibe, as well as that of Papa Hughie’s Raw Bar, which they opened several years ago in the same strip center at the urging of their son, Troy. From the rustic wood-paneled dining rooms to the small but well-stocked fresh seafood market in its foyer, Seafood World is known for fresh local fish and seafood and a smattering of Bahamian classics like conch chowder, conch fritters and cracked conch as well as a longtime standby side dish, pigeon peas and rice. (Even the tuna fish sandwiches are made from fresh tuna, and the menu almost always has hogfish, arguably Florida’s best fish.)
This place is not fancy, and it’s not chic; it’s just a down-home wonder of Old Florida, with one foot in the islands. The result is an extensive menu, old-timey warm service, and consistently excellent food. And although it hasn’t been around as long as Seafood World, Papa Hughie’s Raw Bar, which generally attracts a younger crowd, has inherited every great quality of its parent, and is really pretty much the same place, but with live music Wed.-Sun., a sushi component, about 8,000 beers and the free-spirited ‘tude of its motto, “We close when the conch shell blows.”
Rustic Inn,
4331 ANGLERS AVE., FORT LAUDERDALE, 954/842-2804
How long it’s been there: 66 years
Why we love it: It started out as a hole-in-the-wall Italian restaurant on the Dania Cut-Off Canal not far from Griffin Road until a random customer spied the owner sitting at the bar picking at some crabs he’d just caught in the canal behind the restaurant. The story goes that the man said he was interested in having some for himself, and before long, a new era was launched and The Rustic Inn (the name came from a discarded motel sign up the road) was born. It was never fancy and it isn’t now; but it has plenty of plain outdoor seating (which is good, since whacking crabs with mallets gets pretty messy), a line out the door most days and a surprisingly extensive menu. Its signature dish is its famous garlic crabs, but the place has it all: oysters, clams (baked, fried, stuffed), frog legs, fried gator, conch fritters, lobster, ribs, steak and on and on. But the point here always goes back to the crabs (which used to be served by the bucketful), accompanied by cold beer, a glimpse of a canal—the kind of bare-bones hangout with enough nostalgia for an Old Florida few even remember now.
Tropical Acres Steakhouse
Tropical Acres Steakhouse,
2500 GRIFFIN ROAD, FORT LAUDERDALE; 954/989-2500
How long in business: 70+ years
Why we love it: It sounds like a subdivision, but Tropical Acres is Greater Fort Lauderdale’s oldest steakhouse, a destination restaurant in the former boonies of western Broward County. Gene Harvey, a restaurateur in Yonkers, New York, purchased an old frame house on Griffin Road in 1949 and converted it into what would become his flagship beef emporium. A vintage postcard offers a peek into its founding: Enormous palm trees and a kitschy pink flamingo usher diners into its modest, low-slung confines. It is, the postcard brags, “one of Florida’s most popular eating places.”
And it remains so, having survived, in its seven decades, two fires, the first of which, in 1964, completely gutted the interior. Harvey would go on to open three more Tropical Acres outposts—in Yonkers, in Boynton Beach, in Pompano Beach. But, like Lazarus risen from the ashes, the O.G. incarnation off Griffin is the only one still standing. Tropical Acres continues to pride itself on service that is as knowledgeable as it is pampering; an approachable design that eschews the glitz and pomp of many a newer steakhouse; and prices that won’t result in too much sticker shock. There’s still a live pianist entertaining customers, many of whom rave about the filet mignon, the salmon, the New York strip steak. This old dog has even learned a new trick or two: In 2020, when restaurants everywhere faced the coronapocalypse, Tropical Acres opened an on-site butcher shop, with dozens of fresh-cut, frozen and ready-to-cook options available for carryout.
ANDY FRAME PHOTOGRAPHY
Clockwise from above: Interior of Ta-boo, brie and pear pizza, the tropical dining room and Coconut Lust dessert
AARON BRISTOL
Ta-boo,
221 WORTH AVE., PALM BEACH, 561/835-3500
How long it’s been there: 60+ years
Why we love it: Ta-boo is a tradition on the Avenue, and arguably its most well known culinary landmark, the place to see and be seen for more than 60 years and counting. It is a local favorite for its Happy Hour, and regulars know to ask for certain tables. Ta-boo stories include the one that says the Bloody Mary was invented here, and that Joe Kennedy had a tryst with Gloria Swanson in the ladies’ room. True or false, it’s that kind of place— full of great gossip, better steaks and a buzz that never really goes away. The food here is a WASPY grill mix that is always good, and certain dishes, like the Coconut Lust dessert, are legendary. The Happy Hour is extremely popular with locals and visitors alike and a great introduction to the restaurant’s mystique—because no one up there has a better bar. Ta-boo is at the heart of Palm Beach but is not off-putting; mere mortals can go there, even if they don’t snag the coveted front window table.
And a few more hits from the ‘80s...
ARTURO’S, 6750 N. Federal Highway, Boca Raton, 561/997-7373 This is old-fashioned white-linen fine Italian cuisine—and it’s been the standard for that in Boca for decades, ever since the Gismondi family launched it in 1983. The Gismondi family, led by late patriarch Arturo Gismondi, hails from Sora, Italy, and opened its first restaurant in the states in Queens in 1957, establishing Arturo’s in Boca Raton decades later. Now, it’s become an institution in Boca and is known for its soft tinkling piano, its garden room, its impressive wine cellar and its blackjacket-and-tie waiters, all an homage to a white-glove dining standard that is rare these days—but a delightful change from the trendy (and loud) pricy “fine dining” go-tos that crowd the market now. Gismondi’s daughters are the third generation to join the family working at the restaurant; Elisa, the eldest, is a pastry chef in her own right, having studied at New York’s famed Hyde Park Culinary Institute and at the renowned Villa d’Este Hotel in Lake Como, Italy. Do not miss the elegant torta primavera cart, the seafood antipasto, the fresh pastas—but you can’t go wrong with anything here. It’s romantic, it’s old world and it’s still a winner.
KATHY’S GAZEBO CAFE, 4199 N. Federal Highway, Boca Raton, 561/395-6033 Kathy’s Gazebo Café was one of Boca’s first “fancy” restaurants some 40-plus years ago, a French/Continental dining spot that has held on to its top-notch quality and reputation ever since. It’s fair to say that Kathy’s Gazebo Café and Arturo’s are the grande dames of Boca’s fine dining scene; both strive for classic cuisine, fine service and an elegant dining experience—and both succeed. Once owned by the late Kathy Sellas, who died in a traffic accident in 1997, the Gazebo is still our special occasion restaurant, the ladies-who-lunch place, the place for pâté and vichyssoise served in a tiny silver tureen. And, of course, its famous Dover sole. It’s a place for a special occasion, a dollop of caviar, celebratory Champagne and the sense that you are dining, not simply going out.
DARREL AND OLIVER’S CAFÉ MAXX, 2601 E. Atlantic
Blvd., Pompano Beach, 954/782-0606 This premier Fort Lauderdale restaurant helmed by celebrity chef Oliver Saucy (which may be the greatest name for a chef) for decades, evolved from the chef’s fascination with real cultural gastronomy—using a wide range of culinary influences from South America, Cuba, Southern Creole, the American Southwest and Asia—paired with the fundamentals of classic French and Mediterranean training. A graduate of the prestigious Culinary Institute of America (CIA) in Hyde Park, N.Y., and a protégée of his Black Forest chef-father, Saucy has been a major influence on South Florida’s culinary scene for several decades. His iconic restaurant reflects a loyal following; an understated but stylish icon dressed in white linen, with cozy booths and tables and straightforward California–esque charm. The menu is mouth-watering and ranges all over the map (literally). On any given night, you might see caviar pie, chilled foie gras mousseline, duck and smoked mozzarella ravioli, corned beef and cabbage, stone crabs and so much more. People come here because this is innovative and masterful cooking that is always top-rate and intriguing. It’s been an experience from, well, day one. And it’s still sublime. Arturo’s
AARON BRISTOL
Duck a l’orange from Kathy’s Gazebo
AARON BRISTOL
Sushi from Cafe Maxx
THOMAS CORDY/THE PALM BEACH POST/ZUMA WIRE
PALM BEACH POST/ZUMAPRESS.COM
Clockwise from right: Owner Curtis Lewis and grandchildren circa 2011, filet mignon with South African lobster tail, the bar and trufflesmoked Gouda mac ‘n’ cheese
GWENDOLYNNE BERRY/THE PALM BEACH POST/ ZUMAPRESS.COM
Okeechobee Steakhouse,
2854 OKEECHOBEE BLVD., WEST PALM BEACH, 561/683-5151
How long in business: 74+ years
Why we love it: When the Okeechobee Drive-In was founded on a remote wooded site west of downtown West Palm in 1947, it advertised “sizzling charcoal broiled steaks” starting at $1. Still at the same location—but now surrounded by strip centers and hunkered down roadside on bustling Okeechobee Boulevard—it was renamed Okeechobee Steakhouse in 1974 by Curtis Lewis, son of the founder.
And it’s the oldest steakhouse in Florida.
Today, the modest-looking ranch-style business is in its third generation, and has expanded to include the Okeechobee Prime Meat Market and the Okeechobee Prime Seafood Market. That sizzling steak has also expanded, spawning a whole menu of dry-aged and hand-cut options, including a bone-in rib-eye described as “what steak tastes like in heaven” for a mere $105.99.
The charm of Okeechobee Steakhouse obviously starts with sublime beef (and seafood, of course), but it’s also the old-timey and slightly worn simplicity of the cozy booths, the wood paneling, the big comfy U-shaped bar. It’s never capitulated to a trendy Miami-esque re-do; it is what it is and always has been—an in-town outpost of the ranch, meant for special dinners, masterful steaks and tried-and-true a la carte menu favorites like shrimp cocktail, escargot, French onion soup, fire-roasted creamed corn, onion rings. And the martinis are still mixed in a silver shaker.
As they ought to be.
18k gold citrine and diamond bracelet, rose gold citrine ring surrounded by diamonds, 18k diamond and gold cuff, yellow diamond ring in 18k white gold with diamonds, yellow and white diamond necklace in18k white gold, all from Jewels In Time
FROM TOP: Rolex watch by Blaken with osytersteel case and link band; 18k rose gold water-resistant Time Pyramid watch with alligator band by Arnold & Son; stainless steel Klepcys Alarm watch with caoutchouc rubber strap by Cyrus; all from Goldsmith & Complications
Hot & Spicy
Fire up your summer with some sparkly diamonds and luxury timepieces
Photogaphy by AARON BRISTOL
Styling by LORI PIERINO
30-carat sapphire ring with diamonds, 60-carat ruby and diamond necklace, 36-carat ruby and diamond bracelet, all from Rosenberg
Diamonds and Co.
18k gold link and Mediterranean coral bead necklace, 18k gold leopardwood and diamond accent bridge crossover ring, 18k gold, tiger’s eye bead and diamond bracelet with toggle lock, 18k gold and coral Italian pepperoncini earrings, all designed and handmade by Aletto
Brothers
18k gold bracelet with multicolor stones with matching earrings, 18k gold green amethyst ring with diamonds and peridot, 18k gold amethyst ring with diamonds and pavé-set amethysts, 18k white gold Kyanite ring with green tsavorite and diamonds, all from Cristino Fine Jewelry
Three-row diamond and platinum band, 18k white and rose gold ring with diamonds and 18k white gold ring with diamonds (both convert to pendants), 18k white gold and diamond scroll bracelet, 18k white gold seven-row diamond bracelet, 18k white gold diamond necklace, all from Altier
Jewelers
The Descendants
Five Boca people whose families go back generations recall the way we were
Written by Rich Pollack
LONG BEFORE IT BECAME the thriving city it is today, Boca Raton was little more than a small farming enclave carved out of mostly wilderness and swamp, settled by pioneers seeking refuge from cold weather or looking for work. Although they are all gone, many of their grandchildren—or even children—remain in South Florida, with several having never left Boca Raton. Here are the stories of five descendants of pioneers, each with memories of growing up here when stoplights were few and everyone knew everyone else.
Joe Ashe
t was an accident that brought Joe Ashe’s grandparents to South
Florida.
Haven Ashe had been working on a road crew in Oak Hill in
North Florida when he was injured on the job.
“The governor gave him the job of bridge tender,” Joe Ashe says, explaining that the family would have to travel almost 200 miles so his grandfather could take the new assignment.
Haven Ashe’s initial job was to maneuver the swing bridge over U.S. Highway 1 at the Hillsboro Canal. While there, Haven and his family lived on a working barge set on dry land. In all, there were 14 of them—Haven and his wife Maude and a dozen children, including Joe’s dad, David, who would later become an important civic leader in the community. (David Ashe, who died in 2015, founded the Boca Raton Historical Society, among other civic achievements.)
“They all got along,” Joe Ashe says.
In 1935, Haven Ashe would become the bridge tender at the span over the Boca Raton Inlet, and he held that position for 35 years. The original bridge was replaced in 1964 and renamed the Haven M. Ashe Memorial Bridge in his honor.
“The bridge was like the corner drugstore,” Joe Ashe says. “Everybody called him Pappy and would come to talk to him.”
Today, many of Haven and Maude Ashe’s descendants still live in the area. So many, that it can be difficult to keep them all straight. “When I get together with my family, we all need name tags,” Joe Ashe says.
Joe’s father, Dave, returned to Boca in 1946 after serving in the Navy during World War II, and along with his wife raised two kids while becoming very active in the community. Dave Ashe started Causeway Lumber, which stretched from Second Avenue to the
Joe Ashe and opposite, the bridge his grandfather, Haven Ashe, operated
railroad tracks north of Palmetto Park Road, and moved the family to a new home in the Royal Palm Yacht and Country Club, which was just being developed.
Boca Raton was a great place to grow up, Joe Ashe says, recalling the time when you could play stickball in the middle of Second Avenue.
“It was a true paradise,” he says. “Everybody that went by waved at you, because we all knew each other.”
He recalls the time in 1964 when parents were up in arms over the location of the proposed new Boca Raton High School.
“They signed a petition, saying why build a school that far west?” Ashe said. “It was considered the Everglades.”
If young people did go out that way, it was probably to go drag racing on Perimeter Road next to the airport or to fire BB guns or shotguns.
Ashe says that a lot of what made Boca Raton special back then has been lost over time. Congestion and growth have taken their toll, but there’s still something, along with family, that keeps him here.
“Even though it’s overgrown and crowded, Boca Raton still sparkles,” Ashe says. “It’s still paradise.”
Diane Chapek Granddaughter of Harley and Harriette Gates Family settled in Boca in 1907
health condition first brought Harley Gates to Boca Raton in 1907 as he fled Poultney, Vermont with the hopes of improving his asthma. He returned in 1913 with his wife Harriette and began his career as a successful farmer and later real estate man who was known as an early promoter of the town. It was the climate, however, that persuaded Gates to stay in South Florida. “He said he would never go back to that cold weather,” his granddaughter, Diane Chapek, now 85, recalls.
The family originally settled on what was called the Palmetto Park Plantation on the northwest corner of Palmetto Park Road and the Intracoastal Waterway, where he grew mostly bananas. By the time Chapek, the child of the Gates’ daughter, came along in 1937, the family was well established.
The city, on the other hand, was far from it, with a population of under about 750 residents at the time. “Everybody knew everybody else,” she says.
Though there were a few cars, and even a gas station on the west side of U.S. 1 near Palmetto Park, most folks, especially children, did a lot of walking. “Some of the kids came to school barefoot,” she remembers.
For Chapek, going to Boca Raton Elementary School meant crossing over railroad tracks, with her grandmother coming to get her and making sure she crossed safely. Trains were not the only thing to worry about back then, however. Chapek was standing in the tall grass one afternoon when she felt something on her leg.
“I got snake-bit while I was coming home,” she says.
With the nearest hospital miles away in either Fort Lauderdale or West Palm Beach—Bethesda Hospital in Boynton Beach didn’t open until 1959, and Boca Raton Community wasn’t built until 1967— Chapek and her grandmother walked to town and hitched a ride to the Army Air Field, which had opened a few years earlier, where a military doctor took a look and diagnosed it as coming from a non-venomous snake.
The military presence was frequent in Boca Raton during the World War II years, and that had a strong impact on the local residents. “I would stand outside on U.S. 1 when there was a military convoy and wave to them,” she says.
Chapek also accompanied her grandmother to the beach when she volunteered to watch for airplanes. “That was a big deal to me,” she says. “Back then I didn’t know it was so important.”
Although she hasn’t lived in Boca Raton since she was still in grade school, Chapek visits now and then and says the change she’s seen has been gradual. It was the building of the 27-story tower at the Boca Raton Hotel and Club in 1967, however, that signaled the end of the town she once knew.
“It was a sign of old Boca Raton disappearing,” she says.
Above, Diane Chapek and her mother, Imogene; right, Harley and Harriette Gates with daughter Imogene
Irene Rufus
Granddaughter of Jasper and Sally Dolphus Family settled in Boca Raton in 1925
rowing up in Boca Raton’s small tight-knit Black community in the 1940s wasn’t easy for Irene Rufus and her relatives. In Rufus’ earlier years, she lived with six siblings and her parents in a two-room house with no running water and no indoor bathroom. School at a small schoolhouse lasted half a day so the children could go out into the field and pick beans. With the south still segregated, members of the community needed to be home before dark or risk a confrontation with the law.
Still, Rufus says, it wasn’t a bad life.
“They were good times,” she says, explaining that she didn’t know a lot about how others in Boca Raton lived. “You really didn’t have anything to compare it with.”
Rufus can trace her roots in Boca Raton back to her grandparents, Jasper and Sally Dolphus, who arrived in the area in 1925, leaving Macon, Georgia to be with other family members and to work on area farms.
“My family has been in Boca Raton for almost 100 years,” Rufus says.
Initially, Rufus’ grandparents lived on a farm in what is now the Boca Teeca area until they could build a home in Pearl City—which encompassed about 50 feet by 150 feet and cost $75.
Jasper and Sally Dolphus came to Florida with five children, including Rufus’ mother Irene, and then had two more children. Their youngest child, the late Lois Martin, would later become a leader within the Pearl City community.
Like many of the Black men who came to Florida during that era, Jasper Dolphus found employment as a sharecropper, earning about 10 percent of the profits. Jasper Dolphus worked on Butts Farm and the Dewey Strickland Farm, while Sally washed dishes at a local restaurant.
Growing up in Pearl City, Rufus climbed trees, rode bicycles and found ways to have fun with the little that they had. Ropes were turned into makeshift swings, and old shoes would be repainted several times over to look like new. Old bicycle frames would also be hung up and painted before new tires were added, transforming them into a new bike for someone in the neighborhood.
Many of the residents of Pearl City, including Rufus’ uncle by marriage, Alex Hughes—one of the first to settle in the community—were related, and that brought the community closer. “If somebody in the community didn’t have something, somebody would make sure they got it,” she says.
Now 82, Rufus has spent much of her life in Boca Raton, working for decades at the Florence Fuller childcare center. Like many Black teens in Boca Raton, Delray Beach and Boynton Beach, Rufus went to Carver High School. She later married Clarence Quinn, Boca’s first Black police officer.
“White people didn’t like being pulled over by a Black police officer,” she recalls. “There were times my husband had to send us out of town because someone threatened us.”
Although she now lives in Fort Lauderdale, Rufus still goes to Ebenezer Baptist Church in Pearl City, where her roots are deeply planted.
Left, Sally Dolphus, and above, Irene Rufus
Bill Mitchell
and Floy Cooke Mitchell had just arrived from Cooke Springs, Alabama on Oct. 1, 1923, when they discovered they were trading a home with all the modern conveniences, including indoor plumbing, for one with almost none.
“We would have to take a bath in a zinc tub with water heated on the stove,” Floy Mitchell wrote in a 1978 paper for the Boca Raton Historical Society.
After her husband asked if she was sure she wanted to stay, Floy Mitchell made it clear she had no intention of leaving.
“I replied that wild horses couldn’t get me away from here,” she wrote. “I had hoped and prayed that we could live in Florida someday, and here we were. This was my first really big answer to prayer.”
From that early beginning, the family grew, with three generations of Mitchells going into the real estate business and taking leadership roles in the community. J.C. Mitchell, who served as mayor from 1939 to 1949—and whose name christens a school— played a major role in bringing the Army Air Field to Boca Raton, according to his grandson Bill Mitchell, Jr.
“He petitioned Congress to bring the base here,” says Mitchell Jr., now the senior pastor at Boca Raton Community Church, which was built by his grandparents on land donated by Floy’s father.
Mitchell, 63, was born after his grandfather died in 1955, but he grew up in east Boca, surrounded by other family members. “My whole family was just walking distance away,” he says. “I do miss that.”
Because everyone was so close, not just in physical distance, Mitchell had a chance to spend time with Floy, who had also served on the city council back in the day and who was also known for having one of the largest spoon collections in the country. “People would come from all over to see her spoons,” he says.
Mitchell says that while there were many advantages to growing up in Boca in the ‘60s, there was a downside. “It was a clean little town, but you had to go elsewhere to do anything,” he says. “If you wanted a good restaurant, you had to go to either Fort Lauderdale or West Palm Beach.”
Although there are those who miss the early days and smalltown feel, Mitchell is pleased with how Boca Raton has transformed into a world-class city.
“I love the downtown,” he says, adding that he has enjoyed its evolution. “When I was young, no one would live downtown.”
Mitchell, too, has undergone a bit of a transformation over the years, having left a 25-year business career to become a pastor. He is following in his grandfather’s footsteps with a focus on helping to make Boca Raton a better community for all through community involvement.
Mitchell is the founder and driving force behind BocaLeads, a monthly business lunch meeting focused on helping professionals grow leadership skills and on making South Florida the best place to work, live and play. “It’s about the common good of the city,” he says. “I spend a lot of time fostering it.” Mitchell says he is fortunate to have grown up in this community, and is glad he’s still here. “I love Boca,” he says. “I loved it then, and I love it now.”
Pastor Bill Mitchell; right, J.C. and Floy Mitchell
Arlene Owens
Daughter of Denver Brittian Family settled in Boca Raton in 1929
rlene Owens has had a front-row seat to watch her once small town transform into a big city. “I’ve lived here almost all my life,” she says. Born in the mid-1940s, Owens was here when the Boca population was under 1,000 in the postwar years; she was here in the ‘60s when the population was about 7,000; and she was here in the 1970s, when Florida Atlantic University and IBM transformed the small town into a big city of close to 30,000 residents.
“Boca Raton was a small, tight-knit community that became a rich man’s playground,” she says.
Today, as Boca Raton is closing in on 100,000 residents, Owens remains in the house she’s lived in near downtown—built in the 1950s— for more than half a century. Boca was so small when she was growing up that once, while Owens was in high school, she had severe abdominal pains and needed to be taken to the hospital. The only ambulance was a hearse from the local funeral home.
“You really had to think positive on that ride,” she said in a piece she later wrote for the Boca Raton Historical Society.
Back then, Boca Raton didn’t extend much farther west than the Old Floresta neighborhood. Fishing and hanging out at the beach and on the dunes near the inlet were favorite pastimes.
The Floresta neighborhood plays a large role in Owens’ family history, since it is the area where her father, Denver Brittian, made a name for himself as an indispensable handyman, far too valuable to be sent into military service.
Originally from Raymond, Georgia, Brittian had dropped out of high school and came to Florida to work on the farms and send money home. Soon, he was hired by architect Herman Von Holst, who along with two other partners took over the Floresta project after architect Addison Mizner went bankrupt.
“My dad went to work for Mr. Von Holst as a teenager,” Owens says. “He did everything. He maintained the homes, did the plumbing, was Mr. Von Holst’s chauffer and was the all-around handy person.”
Because he worked for Von Holst, Brittian received free housing, and the family lived in a two-story home on Palmetto Park Road and Fourth Avenue that had been built by one of the earlier settlers. With the coming of the army airfield in the 1940s, the house had to make way, so Brittian moved the house to 40 acres on Palmetto Park Road, piece by piece.
During the war years, many of the homes in Floresta served as quarters for officers from the base and their families, and Von Holst used his connections with them to help get Owens’ father a deferment.
In the 1960s, before Boca Raton High School was built, Owens graduated from Seacrest High School in Delray Beach. She later worked in a plastics factory in the industrial section of the city, near Glades Road and the railroad track. Back then, there was quite a bit of industry in the town, including a meat-smoking plant and a cookie factory.
Though Owens enjoys living in Boca today, there are things from the past that she still misses.
“It was cool when you could build a bonfire on the beach,” she says.
From top, Arlene Owens; Jim Brittian, Denver Brittian, Frances Brittian and Arlene Brittian; Denver, Frances and Arlene Brittian (in first car) at Africa USA
Tim and Cindy Snow's electric vacation
Written by TYLER CHILDRESS
hen most envision their summer vacations, they picture warm beaches, cool water and frozen drinks somewhere far from home and work. These pampered retreats from day-to-day life don’t usually include, say, tearing down a midwestern highway through a wall of sand to see where the next lightning strike will be. But Tim and Cindy Snow don’t vacation like most.
Storm chasing has become more of a subculture than a hobby for those daring enough to venture into extreme weather for scientific discovery, or just for adventure. After seeing the work of storm chasing videographer Mike Olbinski, Tim and Cindy Snow decided their yearly “experience” vacation away from the duties of the George Snow Scholarship Fund would be in Arizona during monsoon season to learn the art of storm chasing photography in a workshop hosted by Olbinski himself. “We have such amazing lightning here in Florida,” says Cindy, and they wanted to learn the skills to be able to storm-chase at home.
Tim Snow says that Olbinski was like a dog chasing a bone when he caught wind of a storm. He’d quickly wrangle them into his Toyota 4Runner and speed across the mountainous desert highways, eyes half on the road and half on the radar on his phone, with the Snows white-knuckling the manic drive. “I was somewhere between the adrenaline high and fear for my life,” says Cindy, but that the lightning is so exciting that “you don’t really give a lot of attention to the danger of it.”
Tim and Cindy would be the first to tell you that storm chasing is not a luxurious endeavor. Eating rotisserie hot dogs from a gas station where you’ve been parked for four hours waiting for lightning to blip on Olbinski’s radar meets the bare minimum criteria for a vacation dining experience. “It’s a lot of hurry up and wait,” says Cindy. But when a bolt strikes, life moves at lightning speed. “When it starts to happen, it’s happening, and you better be ready for it,” says Tim.
The Snows were riding with Olbinski around Douglas, Arizona, after already driving for hours without even a hint of lightning. It had been an uneventful day until dark clouds began gathering across the Mexican border. “You could just see it was crazy, so we ran over there, pulled over on the side of the road and set up,” says Tim, and they managed to snap this picture just before the sunset. “When you hear [the camera] click and you know you nailed it, you get excited,” says Cindy.
These photos were taken after a long day. Tim and Cindy were exhausted, and Olbinski was driving them back to their rental in Tucson when he saw lightning hitting east toward New Mexico. “We’re going home and he’s on his radar, and all of a sudden he cuts three lanes across, then goes in the opposite direction,” says Cindy. “He’s hauling ass on whatever road it was, and we got a speeding ticket,” says Tim, and apparently this wasn’t the first time. Cindy says the officer knew Olbinski, who tried to sweet-talk his way out of the ticket but ultimately failed. Undeterred, Cindy asked the officer if he could give them a police escort to the storm. “You can imagine how that went,” says Cindy.
Cindy and Tim Snow
ABOVE: On the day this photo was taken, the Snows witnessed the Holy Grail of storm chasing: a haboob. A haboob is a giant dust storm, one that stretches from the ground to magnificent heights and rolls across the land like a thick, brown fog, and the Snows had the misfortune of encountering it while they were driving. “You see the dust rolling in, and it overtakes you where nothing is visible,” says Cindy. “It’s a little scary, because you don’t know what’s in front of you or what’s coming behind you, [and] you can’t pull off because you don’t know where the road ends or starts.” They saw a semi truck flipped over on its side from the haboob, which made the Snows think about how much lighter their 4Runner was than a semi.
LEFT: Tim says that Mike Olbinski had a way of getting them to the perfect place to shoot while also making sure they were safe and dry. “When you’re dealing with lightning, my concern is how do you get on the right side of it,” says Tim. This photo, taken just outside a storm, is one Cindy particularly enjoys. “It’s kinda cool to see the clear sky with the lightning and also the rain and the buildup in the clouds,” says Cindy. Getting a perfect shot isn’t easy, but the work is well worth it. “It’s very fulfilling,” says Tim. “When you’re doing it, it’s kind of driving you crazy, because you’re in a little car, and you’ve read everything you want to read on your phone and there’s nothing to do, but when you get home, you start looking at some of the shots you got, and you’re like, ‘yeah this was totally worth it.’”
WEB EXTRA:
For more of the Snows’ dramatic lightning storm images, visit BOCAMAG.
COM/MAY-JUNE-2022.
