Once again, Pinellas County could find itself way ahead of Hillsborough on the list of places where interesting and increasingly affluent people want to be. Or not.
It all depends on what the people of Treasure Island do in the next few months.
The little island that time forgot has a cache of 1950s motels built in a style that is fast becoming popular among Gen X vacationers and cultural tourists — and important to some preservationists and architects.
Call it Googie, Space Age, Flintstone Revival, Doo Wop, Jetson Fantasy or Mid-century Modern; the exuberant, often kitschy style of 1950s buildings, signs, fashion, and furniture is experiencing a resurgence nationwide. The style is characterized by the clean lines and geometric forms of Art Deco and Art Moderne combined with futuristic fantasy elements (such as rockets and flying saucers), boomerang and kidney-bean shapes, asymmetrical designs, upswept roofs, bold angles and plenty of neon and dramatic lighting. Built during the postwar boom, these buildings capture the optimism, excitement and fantasies of the era.
Vacationers known as retro-tourists are seeking out areas that have concentrations of these buildings.
Michael Stutz, a Gen X writer living in Dayton, Ohio, is one such traveler. Three years ago, he was planning a trip to Florida. "I wanted to see the old Florida," he says. "What some people call the real Florida. … My generation isn't interested in vacationing at the same old condos with no character. We like to find unique places."
Someone told him about the 1950s motels on Treasure Island, so he booked a room in one and came on down. "I was completely charmed," he says. "I've been going there ever since."
He was surprised to find that the people in Treasure Island, even the motel owners, had no idea their buildings were considered historic, and that people would come from far away just to see and stay in them. "They aren't marketing it," he says. "They don't know what they have. … To them it's just old."
Wildwood, N. J., and Palm Springs, Calif., have pioneered the move to preserve and restore their collections of Mid-century motels and are already luring retro-tourists. A group in Wildwood called the Doo Wop Preservation League has been working for more than 10 years to rescue buildings from the wrecking ball and make restoration profitable by promoting the area as a unique tourist destination. The restored buildings have been credited with sparking a renaissance of the once scruffy seaside tourist town, accompanied by increasing property values and a revitalized and expanded tourism industry.
Miami, which enjoyed a huge boost from the tourism generated by the renovated Art Deco hotels on South Beach, is also getting in on the act. Writers, preservationists and planners are starting to define a style called MiMo for Miami Modern, a combination of Art Deco and Modern, built in Miami Beach from the mid 1940s through the '60s. MiMo vacation architecture is a more upscale, grand, urban version than that of Treasure Island and Wildwood. A good example is Morris Lapidus' swanky Fontainbleau and Eden Roc hotels, which featured glamorous movie-set-style lobbies.
Treasure Island's motels, by contrast, tend to be more modest and suburban: long, low concrete buildings with airy central patios and pools. One of the most typical, the Surf, was recently sold to a developer who plans to raze the building in May and replace it with a hotel-condominium.
There are critical moments in a town's development, where irreversible choices are made that will affect the essence of the place forever. Make the wrong choices, and you end up just another soulless, generic dot on the map. Make the right decisions, and you'll have a great place to live and visit.
That's the fork in the road where Treasure Island finds itself right now. There are no protections for these buildings. The three Art Moderne causeways are already slated to be replaced, and many of the old motels have already been razed. More will follow as economic pressures force owners to sell to corporations.
Treasure Island, together with the increasingly livable and attractive St. Petersburg, could create a truly unique area and profitable tourist destination.
Other cities have found ways to make preservation lucrative, and some local officials, activists and business people are stirring up interest. The Treasure Island Partnership and Hotel Motel Association are sponsoring a community seminar on redevelopment and historic preservation with Mary Ruffin Hanbury from the National Trust for Historic Preservation at 7 p.m. March 22 at the Community Center, 1 Park Place on Treasure Island.
It's a good first step.
Michael Stutz believes Treasure Island could become a world-class destination because of its googie motels. The question is, do the people who live and work there believe it? Will they find a balance between economic pressures and quality of life? Or will everything that is exceptional about Treasure Island simply disappear?
For more information on the motels and efforts to save them, visit http://recentpast.org/groups/treasure/
Contributing Editor Susan F. Edwards can be reached at susan.edwards15@verizon.net.
This article appears in Mar 11-17, 2004.