As Downtown Magazine reported, the hotel marked its centennial with a Roaring Twenties gala and a 1,000-drone light show over the Giralda tower in mid-January, the same week the building's opening date turned one hundred. The event took place about eight months ago.
Meanwhile, Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden has four dated events between now and mid-October. The lineup includes the Member's Day Plant Sale, a longstanding Fairchild tradition. Here are the events still ahead in Coral Gables this fall.
The Biltmore's Centennial Year
As WLRN reported, George Merrick built the Biltmore in 1925 as the anchor of his City Beautiful, bringing in hotelier John McEntee Bowman and architects Schultze and Weaver to deliver a 150-acre resort with a 300-foot tower modeled on Seville's Giralda. It opened January 15, 1926. The original pool held 600,000 gallons of water, one of the largest in the continental United States at the time, and the pool that replaced it is still the largest hotel pool on the East Coast.
The city of Coral Gables took ownership of the property in 1973 after the building sat vacant for years. It reopened as a resort in 1987, closed again briefly in 1990, then found stable footing in 1992 when Seaway Hotels Corp took over and invested $40 million into the golf course, the spa, and the pool. Seaway has managed the property ever since, more than three decades now.
"One that it ties to the past and the historic legacy that she had," Tom Prescott, president and CEO of Seaway Hotels Corp, told WLRN about the centennial framing.
That framing survived a rough patch in 2024, when Coral Gables officials halted renovations on the hotel's ground floor after discovering that contractors had stripped or covered historic features, including original marble flooring, without the required permits.
For visitors interested in the centennial, a Centennial Package remains bookable for an overnight stay, and limited-edition keepsakes are sold at the hotel's Peacock & Finch shop. A report on the centennial from last year mentioned a golf tournament and a larger anniversary weekend planned as part of the year's programming, though we found no confirmed date for either as of this writing.
Fairchild's Fall Calendar
Fairchild's Member's Day Plant Sale, scheduled this year for October 3, is a tradition the garden itself says started more than 86 years ago under founder Dr. David Fairchild. Do the arithmetic and that puts its first year somewhere around 1940, before the Biltmore had even been converted into a wartime veterans' hospital during World War II. The garden isn't celebrating a milestone this fall. It's just doing what it always does, on roughly the same weekend it's always done it, making it a familiar fixture on the neighborhood calendar.
The rest of Fairchild's fall lineup is dated and specific enough to build a month around:
| Date | Event | What it actually is |
|---|---|---|
| Sept 12-13 | Bromeliad Society Sale | 12 to 15 vendors selling bromeliads, orchids, and tropical plants across the Palmetum and Rainforest areas, regular admission |
| Sept 25 | Full Moon Ramble | An after-dark walk through the garden under the full moon |
| Oct 3 | Member's Day Plant Sale | Members get a 90-minute early shopping window starting 8:30 a.m., plus guided tours of the Tropical Plant Conservatory and Rare Plant House at 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. |
| Oct 10-11 | Orchids in October | A weekend of orchid displays and vendor booths, part of Fairchild's regular fall lineup |
If you're a member, Tuesday mornings also get you into the garden an hour early, at 7 a.m., through the South Entrance Gate, before the heat and the crowds arrive. That's not a special fall event. It's a standing benefit for Fairchild members.
Two Institutions, Two Different Kinds of Old
The Biltmore and Fairchild offer different ways to experience Coral Gables' history. The Biltmore marked its centennial with a gala in January, while Fairchild's fall calendar features recurring events, including the Member's Day Plant Sale.
The Biltmore's 300-foot tower and pool offer a historic setting, while Fairchild's dated events give visitors specific opportunities to explore the garden this fall.
What This Actually Means If You Live Here
None of this requires planning far ahead. The Bromeliad Society sale is this weekend. The Full Moon Ramble is later this month. Member's Day and Orchids in October both land in the first two weeks of October, close enough together that a single membership card gets you into both without paying twice. The Biltmore is worth a visit for its pool and golf course, while Fairchild's dated events offer opportunities to plan a visit this fall.
If you're weighing which one to build a Saturday around, the plant sale has the harder deadline. Quantities are limited, and Fairchild recommends bringing a wagon or cart, which tells you something about how seriously regulars take it. The Biltmore's centennial keepsakes, by contrast, will presumably still be on the shelf at Peacock & Finch next month.
Coral Gables gets a lot of attention this year for what's new. The fall calendar includes Fairchild's longstanding traditions, while the Biltmore's centennial gala took place in January. If you've lived here a while, you probably already knew Fairchild ran like this. If you didn't, October is a good month to find out.
For more on what's shaping daily life in Coral Gables and the neighborhoods around it, Pam Mayers and the Mayers Group keep a close eye on the calendar as much as the market. Let's Connect. Schedule a Consultation whenever you're ready to talk about what's actually happening on the ground here.
