Social Key Biscayne VI

Key Biscayne Essential: Puntino Italian Restaurant

If the offerings of Italian cuisine at Puntino smack of the flavors from Venice and Rome, it’s because the entire concept is a direct Italian import. Owner Cristoforo Pignata arrived here from Napoli just over four years ago, having spent a career overseeing his family’s luxury hotel empire that expands throughout Italy and into Switzerland. He is now building the Puntino cuisine experience, which in addition to the fine dining outfit on Key Biscayne today includes a neighboring pizzeria, a catering company that can accommodate any crowd, a bistro on Lincoln Road, and Pizza Napoli – which is a food truck serving the hot, cheesy slices and fresh baked pies.

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Five Questions for Meme Ferré

Artist and Key Biscayne resident Meme Ferré, 56, has lived all over the world but grew up just around the corner. Her childhood home was a private residence that has since been transformed by developer Ugo Columbo into the clubhouse for the 51-story Santa Maria condominiums on Brickell Avenue. She graduated from Carrollton School of the Sacred Heart, and has studied her craft in India, Paris and London, and has an undergraduate degree from Pratt Institute and a graduate degree from New York University. These days, as her three children and three step children — ranging from age 28 to age 36 — are grown, Ferré teaches art at North Beach Elementary School and also works from her studio Casa Coqui Miami in the Wynwood Art District. We caught up with her to talk about creating a beautiful life.

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Voyages by Brett Graff

Social Key Biscayne editor, Brett Graff, took her talents around the key and snapped some great shots of locals living and socializing.

Pictured: Debby Zalbuldowski and Ronda Fuchs at Cioppino
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Essentially Key Biscayne: Cristina Figueredo Zizold

Key Biscayner Cristina Figueredo Zizold chose a career in art instead of medicine, but eventually combined all her interests and found a creative way to help heal kids. Zizold is the founder of Art Heart, which runs art classes and events at Holtz Children’s Hospital. Specializing in holiday related projects, the organization brings art supplies – and often, local artists – to young patients and supervises the creative processes during their often extended hospital stays.

Pictured: Cristina Zizold supervises the creation of Valentine’s Day cards at the Holtz Children’s Hospital
 
 

Five Questions for Theodora Long

Theodora H. Long is executive director of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Biscayne Nature Center, an organization dedicated to conservation and situated in Crandon Park along the coastal beaches it seeks to preserve. With an ocean full of sea life to explore in its backyard and a facility that includes exhibit space, a demonstration lab and massive tanks filled with local seahorses and eels, the center has been providing programming to the community since 1969. We sat down with Long to find out about our island’s treasures – including information about best ice cream treat in town.
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Voyages by Brett Graff

Social Key Biscayne editor, Brett Graff, took her talents around the key and snapped some great shots of locals living and socializing.

Pictured: Lesa Blackman at the Key Biscayne Yacht Club
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Whiskey Joe’s – Key Biscayne Foodie Find

With fresh fare on the table and a dramatic view out back, this casual island eatery elevates relaxed, outdoor dining.

If Key Biscayne were missing a link between its own, elegant lifestyle and that of the casual, kick-back flavor of the Florida Keys to its south, the cultures have been connected by Whiskey Joe’s. Operated by Rusty Pelican owners and located in the Rickenbacker Marina, the surrounding waterfront combined with the sophisticated Brickell Avenue skyline becomes a breathtaking backdrop.
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Essentially Key Biscayne: The Yidi Family

Families bond on vacation all the time but on Key Biscayne, the Yidi family is connecting over the exact opposite: work. That’s because the family’s two children — Andres, who’s enrolled at Lynn University in Boca Raton and his sister Natalia, who attends Gulliver Preparatory School — founded Ytex, a business selling strings for tennis racquets.

Pictured: Yidi family at The Sony Ericsson Open
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Five Questions for Federico Sanchez

Federico Sanchez, 45, is the founder of Menscience, a line of men’s skincare and nutritional products that’s sold in Barney’s New York, Nordstrom, in the company’s new flagship store in Manhattan’s Soho and throughout over 30 countries in Europe, Asia, Australia and the Americas, as well as online. He lives on Key Biscayne’s Woodcrest Lane – an island resident for 14 years – with his wife Adriana and their two children, Sophia (age 11) and Maya (age 9.) We caught up with him to learn the company’s secret to grooming and also goodwill.

Pictured: Adriana and Federico Sanchez
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Voyages by Brett Graff

Social Key Biscayne editor, Brett Graff, took her talents around the key and snapped some great shots of locals living and socializing.

Pictured: Gisella Remos at Oxygen Day Spa

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Five Questions for Jaime Ferreyros

Jaime Ferreyros, age 52, captures much of his life through a lens. When the senior writer and producer at Univision’s Deportes – the network’s newly launched sports channel – isn’t filming content for Spanish language viewers, he’s an avid iPhoneographer. Many of his images are scenes from Key Biscayne, where he lives with his wife, Key Biscayne Community School teacher Paloma Ferreyros – while their three children, Paloma (age 26) Alejandra (age 25) and Jaime (age 23) either work or study elsewhere. Ferreyros, however, is busy getting ready for his next photography exhibit in October at the Lunch Box Gallery in Wynwood. We caught up with him and learned a lot about his little known hobby.
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KB Essential: Winnie Pritchett and Amy Zambrano

Zambrano and Prichett have a good view of the statistics and the stories behind them because they founded iPadsforSoldiers.com, a non-profit organization that raises money — and spends every penny, meaning zero administrative costs – to buy these portable devices for those fighting in the war in Afghanistan. Since 2009, when Pritchett’s son was deployed, the organization has purchased and presented nearly 900 iPads to military members, first targeting those stationed in remote locations – so they could communicate with their families, listen to music and even take college courses.

Pictured: Amy Zambrano and Winnie Pritchett deliver iPads to soldiers at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center
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Voyages by Brett Graff

Social Key Biscayne editor, Brett Graff, took her talents around the key and snapped some great shots of locals living and socializing.

Pictured: Ana Maria and Alvaro Chaparro at the Rusty Pelican
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VIDEO: Beach at Sunrise


Presented by the Biscayne Nature Center

Beach at Sunrise is modeled after the concluding nature segment on the television show, Sunday Morning on CBS. This piece is the first in a series of shorts that shows the natural surroundings of the Biscayne Nature Center, a fantastical environment located in Key Biscayne. Beach at Sunrise displays the tranquility of early morning at the ocean with the waves gently caressing the sand as algae floats in the current and ducks rest upon the ocean’s edge.

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Five Questions for Isabel Bucaram

Isabel Bucaram is the public relations manager for CNN en Español US and the VIP Planning Producer for the network. She is married to Cristobal Schlaubitz and her two children, Isabella Montana (age 11) and Francisco Montana (age 7) attend the Key Biscayne K-8 Center. Born in Ecuador, Bucaram moved to Key Biscayne from Pinecrest in 2008. We caught up with her to hear about her take on life here at home and the news worldwide.
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Essentially Key Biscayne: John White


For Key Biscayne resident John White, hurricane season has a few additional complications. Because while storms threaten all our island’s homes, White’s also happens to be filled with an antique clock collection he’s been building for over 40 years. So each summer, before the tropical seas even think about stirring, White packs up his timepieces — some weighing as much as 150 pounds — and places them into secure locations throughout South Florida.

“I became interested in clocks because they’re mechanical and they’re attractive,” he says. “They do more than tell time. Each one is actually a piece of artwork.”
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Voyages by Brett Graff


Social Key Biscayne editor, Brett Graff, took her talents around the key and snapped some great shots of locals living and socializing.

Pictured: Lesley Hernandez and Carolina Zalles at the Grand Bay Club
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Key Biscayne Essential: Lourdes Jofre Collett


This year marks the 25th anniversary for the Baptist Cardiac & Vascular Institute and Key Biscayne resident Lourdes Jofre Collett is celebrating. To commemorate the occasion, she’s organizing an event for the community’s most prominent philanthropists. And it’s here that she’ll give them a first look at the renderings and the maquette — before construction begins — for the vast and cutting-edge facility that’s being planned to house the institute. Because if you’re serious about having a world-renowned facility in your backyard, and you’re ready to contribute the kind of money that’s necessary for innovative practices and for procedures that haven’t even been invented yet, well, you may have to choose the pavilion or armory of medical equipment that will bear your name.
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Five Questions for Nancy Levitt Davis

Nancy Levitt Davis, Director of Development at New World Symphony, moved to Key Biscayne from Manhattan in 2003 with her husband Scott. Today they have three kids Spencer (age 8), Joshua (age 6), Bradley (age 4), all attending St. Christopher’s by The Sea Montessori School. We caught up with this working mom to ask her five quick facts about life both here on the Key and off.

What’s your favorite dinner on Key Biscayne?
My new favorite meal is ceviche from Marcelo’s truck. I enjoy Sunday afternoons at the beach and the Ritz KB – skinny mojitos or margaritas with chips and guacamole…
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Voyages by Brett Graff

Social Key Biscayne editor, Brett Graff, took her talents around the key and snapped some great shots of locals living and socializing.

Pictured: Randall and Lori Rombiero at the Ritz-Carlton, Key Biscayne’s Mixologist contest to launch Social Key Biscayne

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