June 2025 | Mike Vogel
With development oriented toward its waterways, Fort Lauderdale lacks an attractive entrance from Interstate 95. Aged and run-down commercial properties for the most part line the Broward Boulevard artery to downtown. If known at all, it’s for traffic and keeping the doors locked.
That will change a bit with downtown condo development Natiivo Fort Lauderdale, a 40-story project by Harvey Hernandez and his Newgard Development Group. Just across from the Fort Lauderdale Brightline station, it’s the first condo in the city built and licensed for short-term rentals and has a rooftop pool, club room, fitness center and ground-floor restaurant. The 384 units are priced from $620,000 to $1.2 million and above.
“Broward Boulevard is finally going to become the gateway to the city from the west that it always should have been,” says Steve Glassman, a Fort Lauderdale city commissioner and vice mayor.
The architect is Arquitectonica, which grew to fame from its Miami base before branching out globally with its Miami-flavored style and projects like the Microsoft European headquarters, Bronx Museum and State Farm Arena in Atlanta. Of late, the firm has been busy in West Palm Beach and Broward. Co-founder Bernardo FortBrescia is the architect for Related Ross’ 15 CityPlace Tower, one of a pair of office buildings that will bring 1 million square feet to the West Palm Beach downtown market in 2027. He’s also the architect for the 26-story Olara, a 287-unit condo building on North Flagler on the Intracoastal Waterway in West Palm Beach. The developer is an affiliate of New York-based Savanna. Units are priced from $2 million to $10 million.
Other Arquitectonica involvements in Palm Beach and Broward include Related Group’s and BH Group’s 138- unit Ritz-Carlton Residences, West Palm Beach, where prices start at $2 million; New York-based Naftali Group’s 45-story, 370-unit Viceroy Residences Fort Lauderdale condo tower; and the St. Regis Resort and Residences, Bahia Mar Resort Fort Lauderdale, being done by Related Group, Tate Capital and Rok Acquisitions. The redevelopment of the Bahia Mar will have two 23-story condo towers totaling 160 units, plus resort residences and a 197-room hotel. Prices start at $4.4 million for the condos and $2 million for the resort residences.