The gardens are notable for introducing classical Italian and French design aesthetics into a subtropical habitat's plant palette and context - a new approach. This resulted in ongoing garden experiments with many tropical plants new to American horticulture. While Vizcaya's landscape design style evokes other periods and places, the use of native stone, plants, and light modulation reflected Deering's desire to showcase the indigenous natural beauty making him one of Miami’s early environmentalists. By 1922, the 180-acre estate included large lagoons and new islands down-coast south of the villa and its formal gardens.

On the estate's western acreage, across present day South Miami Avenue were the produce gardens and grazing fields. A Village compound was designed and built to the west also. These endeavours were done with the intent of making Vizcaya primarily self-sufficient, modeled on European estates to compensate the limited commodities and services of early 1920’s Miami. The Village buildings housed the property's staff quarters, auto garages, equipment sheds, and workshops and also barns for the domesticated animals.

Lunch was very elegantly presented (glad it wasn’t me though that had to face the raw ‘trees’)

Deering spent winters here beginning in 1916, when the residence was sufficiently complete. Among James Deering's closest friends were painter Gari Melchers and his wife Corinne. Through his brother Charles, also a patron of the arts and collector, he had friendships with the painters John Singer Sargent and Anders Zorn. Sargent visited Vizcaya in March 1917 and produced a series of watercolors of the estate, as well as portrait of James. After the extensive gardens were completed in 1923, Deering's health began to weaken. Nonetheless he traveled and entertained guests, including the silent film stars Lillian Gish and Marion Davies. Deering was described in his later years as "a reticent man with impeccably proper manners, leavened by a sense of humour." He was not like a 'Jay Gatsby' figure of the 'Roaring Twenties' era. In 1923 he opened the gardens to the public on Sundays, and Deering reportedly watched the visitors from his balcony, curious about who came but not wanting to be recognised for his hospitality. In this period's personal letters, he expressed the hope that his nieces and nephews would enjoy coming to Vizcaya, so tennis courts, a bowling alley, a billiard room and a swimming pool were part of the estate to encourage their visits.

James Deering was born in 1859 in the town of South Paris, Maine. He was the son of William Deering and his second wife, Clara Hammond Deering. His older half-brother was the arts patron Charles Deering. His father, had inherited the family Woolen Mill and was landowner in the Northeast, invested in a farm equipment manufacturing company, renaming it the Deering Harvester Company. In 1873 he moved the family to Chicago, Illinois. New 'Deering Harvester Company' reaper machinery enabled Midwestern U.S. farmers to harvest an acre of grain per hour, a substantial increase in productivity that increased the profitability of Mid-West agriculture significantly. The Deering Harvester Company grew in value, the fourth largest in the U.S. at the time, so that by the end of the nineteenth century the Deerings had become one of America's wealthiest families. His father was conservative in family spending but his parents did acquire a residence in St. Augustine, Florida for the winter season. James Deering's older brother, Charles Deering, joined the family business in the 1880’s, after attending the United States Naval Academy and nine years in the Navy. James Deering attended one year each at Northwestern University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology before also joining the company at the same time.

Career: James joined the Deering Harvester Company in 1880 as treasurer. In 1902, with the Bank of J.P. Morgan purchasing Deering Harvester Company and McCormick Reaper Company, a resulting merger formed the International Harvester corporation and the largest producer of agricultural machinery in the nation. James Deering became vice-president of the new corporation, responsible for the three Illinois manufacturing plants. In 1909 he was phased out of daily company affairs by J.P. Morgan interests. By the turn of the century, James Deering owned homes on Lake Shore Drive in Chicago, in the countryside near Evanston, Illinois, in New York City and in Paris, France. His name appeared in social columns as an arts connoisseur, socialite, international traveler and cultural ambassador. He hosted events for French dignitaries at his New York and Chicago residences. In 1906, for his work in promoting French development in agricultural technology, he was awarded the Légion d'honneur ("National Order of the Legion of Honour"). He retired from the vice-presidency of International Harvester, his health was weakening due to pernicious anemia, so in 1910 Deering purchased land in Coconut Grove, south of Miami and north of his brother's Charles Deering Estate. James Deering never married.

Death and legacy: James Deering died in September 1925, onboard the steamship SS City of Paris en route back to the USA. The philanthropic beneficiaries of his estate were Wesley Hospital, founded by his father in Chicago; the Visiting Nurse Association; the Children's Hospital of Chicago; and the Art Institute of Chicago which received several significant paintings: the Édouard Manet "Mocking of Christ," and three by Italian master Giambattista Tiepolo of Rinaldo and Armida, based on scenes from the 16th-century epic Gerusalemme Liberata by Torquato Tasso.

Following the death of Charles Deering, Villa Vizcaya passed to his two nieces, Marion Deering McCormick and Barbara Deering Danielson, a minimal staff maintained the property. Over the decades, the 1926 hurricane which did severe damage and rising maintenance costs, they began selling the estate's surrounding land parcels. In 1952, at a below-market price, they sold the villa and formal gardens, and in 1955 the village 'core estate' to Miami-Dade County for a museum and gardens to be open to the public. With the initial sale they donated the antiquities and furnishings to the County-Museum.

Museum and Gardens: Unlike many other historic house museums, Vizcaya contains the original antiques and furnishings, giving continuity to experience Deering's era. His brother Charles Deering's nearby estate, now named 'The Deering Estate at Cutler', is also open to the public and owned by Miami-Dade County but without art and furnishings. James Deering's estate, now named Vizcaya Museum and Gardens, is an accredited museum and National Historic Landmark. The villa, gardens, and village are under ongoing restoration. The Vizcaya Museum and Gardens mission is "to preserve Vizcaya to engage our community and its visitors in learning through the arts, history, and the environment."

ALL IN ALL A UNIQUE TREASURE IN MIAMI

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