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Though not really quite a mile, nor particularly miraculous, this street and parallel ones are mostly about nice shops and elegant eateries.

This is a place to walk (see CocoWalk), but it’s probably best not to venture more than a few blocks west of CocoWalk (“Black Grove,” sadly, is uninviting).

Driving around Coral Gables to take in these charming residences, done up in the styles of various national and regional cultures, will take perhaps a couple of hours (see Merrick’s Coral Gables Fantasies).

This unusual house, lived in by the descendants of its original builder until 1973, is the area’s oldest, built in 1891 (see Barnacle State Historic Site).

A recreation of a 16thcentury Italian villa with formal gardens.

Inimitably beautiful and grand, this is one of the world’s most gorgeous hotels, opened in 1926.

Merrick’s deliciously Baroque paean to his father, a Congregational minister, was Coral Gables’ first church and remains the city’s most beautiful.

Considered the world’s most beautiful public swimming pool. You could spend half a day enjoying its charms (see Venetian Pool & Venetian Pool).

The boyhood home of George Merrick (see Merrick’s Coral Gables Fantasies) has been restored to its 1920s look, and it’s remarkable to reflect on how modest the man’s background was compared to the grandeur of the dreams he realized. The city of Coral Gables took its name from this house. The stone was quarried from what is now the Venetian Pool.

In a reversal of the usual story, this period Mediterranean-Revival building, in the Spanish Rococo style, was built in 1926 as a movie house and later converted to a theater.