Walking on white sand, I crossed into this Lilly Pulitzer-clad kingdom of frivolity just past the public beach in Lake Worth. Pelicans filled the air; surfers rode the storm surge; and I headed north to where estates stretch from the ocean to the intracoastal and bougainvillea blooms like dandelions, where the clear blue Gulf Stream runs close to shore, and there are walls of glossy ficus hedges. Here a fabulous excess belongs to another time: a small, medium, and large poodle to every Bentley convertible, country clubs with saltwater swimming pools, and trash pickup every weekday.
Glimpses of life lived large
Where sun is king, sample gilded-age living and shuttle flights imagined and real
In the 1880s Henry Flagler, a stern-faced, mustachioed founder of Standard Oil, made the swampy wilderness of Palm Beach accessible with his Florida East Coast Railway. He built the Georgian-style Royal Poinciana Hotel, at one time the world's largest, and his own home, a Beaux-Arts mansion called Whitehall. Soon this was the winter home of East Coast society. Over the years Camelot came, along with the Du Ponts and the Dodges, Estée Lauder and John Lennon. Now, 130 years later, the place still thrives but as sort of a campy caricature of its former self. The Royal Poinciana was torn down; Whitehall is a museum; the Kennedys are long gone. Yoko Ono and Larry Flynt left, even billionaire investor Ronald Perelman recently sold his 6-acre estate for $70 million. But Donald Trump, Rod Stewart, Vera Wang, Vic Damone, Jimmy Buffett, Anne Coulter, and Rush Limbaugh are here, and you can still buy three kinds of caviar at the drugstore.
Most of what happens in Palm Beach happens in the pri vate clubs, on the golf courses and yachts, behind the hedges and wrought iron gates. Everywhere there are signs and guards warning no parking, no trespassing, or private property. More than most places, to see Palm Beach is to see only so much. But on foot, on a long, aimless saunter, you can see a lot. Peek through the hedges, stop for lunch, peer through the windows, buy something, get your feet wet on the beach, have dinner, stay somewhere. Soon you'll have seen plenty.
The estate section
Palm Beach is almost as long as Manhattan but not quite as wide.
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