Designer decadence in Miami

Miami has sun at times of the year when Northern Europe is under a dank blanket, a wide beach full of watchable people and some of the swankiest hotels and bars on the planet - making it the best possible escape from Cold Britannia. We started our east coast odyssey at the W South Beach, owned by Aby Rosen, one of the biggest Germans (both literally and figuratively) in the New York gossip columns, thanks to his public spat with his business partner Ian Schrager. He's an avid contemporary art collector, so we were greeted by giant Miffy and Hello Kitty fountains by Tom Sachs and a ground floor full of Hirsts and Basquiats.

Miami takes art seriously. Our visit coincided with the Art Basel fair and the place was crawling with glamorous international dealers. They'd booked out the whole of the hotel's famous Mr Chow restaurant for their wheeling and dealing but we found a space at the plush Spanish alternative, Solea, for truffled eggs on crispy potatoes. Then we lounged by the giant pool where my husband was excited to see permatanned human lizard George Hamilton emerging from the Gents. But I was too busy marvelling at the Miami legs parading around me, which mostly resemble pipe cleaners (naturally, the average skirt length is around six inches).

All the W's bedrooms have ocean views and the sight of the early morning surfers out chasing waves is enough to get anyone leaping out of bed - except me. Instead we lingered over vast plates of ham and eggs at the News Café, one of the most famous hangouts on the seafront, where Cuban émigrés meet to gossip and wait (still) for the fall of the Castros. We followed this with a wander round the nearby vintage shops, including Beatnix and Miami Twice, all brimming with barely used Jimmy Choo stilettos and Tory Burch flats, alongside Versace prints so loud you need to buy a pair of Ray-Bans just to contemplate them. The shoppers were worth gawping at as well - Russian bloods in tight black jackets and pink shirts, aiming for the early Corleone look, and wannabe actresses with deep, deep tans. Mahogany flesh is always on display around the beach; one lady in the hotel lift was wearing a bodice unbuttoned so low that one breast had escaped. No one affected to notice the wardrobe malfunction.

But there's more to Miami than bronzed boobs. We headed downtown to the Conrad Hilton, housed in a vertiginous skyscraper - we stayed on floor 28 but still weren't at the top. The hotel's downtown location is ideal for getting a sense of the real city. You're in the heart of working Miami here, with the money men and women glued to their cell phones at breakfast, but there's still a sense that everyone is rather enjoying the rush and will be stopping for margaritas and ceviche at the end of the day. After a stint in the spa we joined the movers and shakers in the hotel's Sky bar for sundowners and to stare down on other people's rooftop swimming pools.

Downtown's design district is the hot destination, with its tumbledown buildings and car washes cheek-by-jowl with art galleries and Miami's hottest designers. Shop here if you're flush, or just gawp at the Tomas Maier store, a cool white haven of scented Cire Trudon candles and racks of grey cashmere throws, alongside jewel-coloured bags and cushions.

From there we took the overland rail to the well-to-do Hispanic suburb of Coral Gables, gawping at the extra-large villas built during the Twenties Renaissance revival. Private mini-golf courses abound and the cars are large, often vintage Cadillacs, and often pink. The twin joys of Coral Gables are its Venetian municipal pool, which must be the grandest public pool anywhere, surrounded by tilework, fountains and greenery, and the towered palace that is the Biltmore Hotel. It's so large that in 1968, the owners found it too dear to run and mothballed it. It reopened in 1987, and remains mostly untouched. I half expected to find Shirley Temple having a tantrum by the pool.

It's a quick taxi trip from there to Vizcaya, the seafront house built in the early years of the century by James Deering, an agricultural entrepreneur and multimillionaire whose taste was anything but rustic. Deering was probably gay (as our guide quaintly put it, 'he never married'), a friend and maybe lover of the portrait artist John Singer Sargent, who also painted him, and threw lavish parties attended by silent film stars including Lillian Gish. Vizcaya is preserved in all its florid faux-Italian Renaissance splendour. You can poke through Deering's library of French and Italian classics as well as English Romantic poetry, ogle at his three Tiepolos and saunter through marble halls open to the ocean. Although it's now owned by the municipality, his silk bedspreads and linen towels are all lovingly preserved, alongside the interiors created for him by the designer Paul Chalfin. Florida's own Jay Gatsby is a symbol of Miami's cycle of rising and falling fortunes. It's a city that's been in and out of fashion, but loves to revel in the luxurious side of life.

Where to stay

W South Beach: The 336-room W boasts a Bliss spa, two outdoor pools, six bars, rooftop tennis and basketball courts and a state-of-the-art fitness centre. Then of course there's the private stretch of beach and a healthy smattering of celebrities. Rooms from $295 room per night (starwoodhotels.com).
Conrad Hilton Miami: The Conrad has two restaurants, two bars, an excellent spa and attentive staff, not to mention fantastic views over the city. Prices start from $179 per room, per night (conradhotels1.hilton.com).