Is Miami Beach’s hottest club reopening? Here’s why those confetti cannons went off
You’ve waited over a year for Miami’s hottest nightclub to reopen...and we’re sorry to say you’re going to have to wait a little longer.
But LIV, shut since last March due to the coronavirus pandemic, did throw open its doors Wednesday night for a special occasion.
Club owner David Grutman brought the class from his FIU Chaplin School of Hospitality course, The Grutman Experience, on a field trip.
Pictures on social media show the students masked up and sitting far apart watching as confetti canyons go off and costumed dancers writhe about the empty(ish) space, which is located on the bottom level of the Fontainebleau hotel on Miami Beach.
Guest speakers included Latin music executive Rebeca Leon, Grutman’s model wife Isabela Grutman and Brazilian pop star Anitta.
In pre-pandemic days, the 18,000 square feet venue had the capacity to hold 1,200 people.
The Chaplin class is maxed out at a little over 100, the biggest in-person course the school currently has going.
Earlier this month, students returned to the Biscayne Bay campus after a long virtual run due to the COVID shutdown. The first “Experience” class was held in a socially distanced manner, with participants masked up. Halfway through, Barstool Sports head Dave Portnoy showed up to throw in his two-plus cents. A certain soccer star, David Beckham, graced the second class a week later.
Grutman – who also runs Swan, Komodo and Story nightclub, among other hot spots – has been giving this course since October 2019, showing locals how to be ballers like him.
“Grutman’s class offers students a chance to experience how entrepreneurship and hospitality interconnect in the Miami business landscape,” says FIU of the native Floridian. “Grutman’s influence on the hospitality and music world is global and his larger than life personality and natural ability to steal the spotlight has catapulted him into continued success and fame.”
This story was originally published March 18, 2021 at 12:27 PM.
