Developer Unveils Luxury Condo on Site of Deadly Surfside Collapse
By Julia Echikson June 12, 2023 5:21 pm
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Damac International has revealed plans for a luxury condominium on the vacant site of the deadly condo collapse in Surfside, Fla., two years ago, tapping Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA) to design the project.
The Dubai-based developer, which paid $120 million for the site, proposed constructing two connected 12-story buildings with a total of 57 units on the 1.8-acre oceanfront parcel at 8777 Collins Avenue. The proposal put forward to the Town of Surfside includes two designs: one with a layered stepback and another without.
Units are set to range between 4,000 and 15,000 square feet. The amenities will include a 100-foot-long rooftop pool as well as a 75-foot-long indoor exercise pool and spa.
Damac had selected fashion label Roberto Cavali, which it owns, to brand the project. But now the developer is “re-considering the branding options,” said Niall Mc Loughlin, Damac’s international senior vice president of communications.
The commission marks the second Miami area project for ZHA, which was founded by the late, Pritzker-prize-winning architect Zaha Hadid. The London-based firm completed the One Thousand Museum condo tower in 2019.
“While no work of architecture can ever remove the pain of the past, nor should it, a truly ambitious work of architecture can respect such a significant site,” Chris Lepine, director at ZHA, said in a statement.
Damac, led by Hussain Sajwani, bought the site in 2022 through a court-ordered auction nearly a year after part of the Champlain Tower South condo building fell, killing 98. The developer was the only bidder.
The move to build a luxury condo on the ill-fated site has rankled some victims’ family members, one of whom called it a burial site. “To see a high-end development built would be very hard for all of us,” Carlos Wainberg, who lost family members in the collapse, said in a court hearing in 2021.
Some had advocated for a land swap that would have allowed developers to buy Surfiside’s nearby community center for a development opportunity, and allow the site of the tragedy to become a memorial. But Miami court circuit judge Michael Hanzman shot down the proposal.
A permanent memorial is set rise on 88th Street.
Julia Echikson can be reached at jechikson@commercialobserver.com.
