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Top Attractions in St Petersburg

Sunken Gardens

The Sunken Gardens are 4 acres of well-established botanical gardens located at 1825 4th Street North, in the center of St. Petersburg, Florida, USA. The Gardens were a commercial tourist attraction for many years, but are now operated by the city and maintained with the help of volunteers. Sunken Gardens are open to the public every day of the week; admission is charged. Sunken Gardens retains their historical interest as an important example of a 1930s Florida roadside commercial attraction, and is probably the oldest commercial tourist attraction on Floridas west coast. The Gardens are open to the public for educational programs, tours, and special events, particularly weddings which have taken place for decades on the Wedding Lawn, and in the banquet facilities in the Garden Room overlooking the unique garden setting.

Museum of Fine Arts

The MFA was founded by art collector and philanthropist Margaret Acheson Stuart (1896–1980). As its first president, Mrs. Stuart contributed significantly to the construction of the building and provided endowment funds through her estate to support annual operations and to maintain the beauty of the grounds. She also provided monies to acquire art and donated works from her collection. The Margaret Acheson Stuart Society, the Museum’s independent support organization, is named in her honor. The city provided the four-acre waterfront site for the construction of the original building and The Junior League of St. Petersburg offered resources for The Great Hall. The building was designed by John Volk and Associates of Palm Beach, with a curving colonnade on Beach Drive that embraces the community. Chartered by the State of Florida in 1961, The MFA opened its Beach Drive doors to the public in 1965–the first art museum in St. Petersburg. The building is an architectural landmark on the downtown waterfront. The Marly Room, an auditorium seating 220, and a sculpture garden, both made possible by Mrs. Stuart, were added to the building in 1974. Moreover, the late President of the Board Charles W. Mackey (Mrs. Stuart’s nephew and trustee Fay Mackey’s father) led a successful effort to double the galleries from ten to twenty and to construct a second floor for administrative offices, a classroom, and a library by 1989. The addition was designed by Harvard, Jolly, Marcet & Associates. A $21 million expansion broke ground on Monday, December 4, 2006 and more than doubled the size of the museum. The new 33,000 square-foot Hazel Hough wing, on the north side of the building, was finished in 2008. The expansion included a new cafe, an enlarged library and a bigger museum shop. The Hazel Hough Wing, designed by Yann Weymouth and Hellmuth, Obata + Kassabaum (HOK), opened to the public March 22 and 23, 2008. At approximately 39,000 square feet, the wing more than doubled the Museum’s space. The two-story glass Mary Alice McClendon Conservatory is now a centerpiece. It provides a community gathering place and has opened up the MFA to its spectacular setting. The second-floor Carol Upham Bridge connects the original building to the Mary and Fred Shuh Lobby and the wing. The MFA Café in the Conservatory and on the terrace provides a wonderful view of the bay. The Museum Store has been named the area’s best by the duPont Registry. Special exhibitions are now presented mainly in the Hazel Hough Wing, with a second-floor gallery devoted to photography and works on paper. In 2013, the original galleries, The Junior League Great Hall, and the Marly Room were renovated and completely transformed under the direction of design advisor Jeff Daly. The Cyrus Fay Mackey and Howard Acheson Galleries adjacent to The Great Hall now display wood floors, as does the Gary and Gail Damkoehler Gallery leading to the Conservatory. Color was added throughout and augmented lighting was put in place. Windows facing Beach Drive were replaced with energy-efficient, storm-rated glass, encouraging visitors to look inside, day and night. In the Marly Room, a striking arched window at the back of the stage was reopened. Restoration of this architectural highlight, in conjunction with the adjacent membership and sculpture gardens, opens up the Museum even more to its lush, tropical setting. The renovation project paved the way for the Museum’s 50th anniversary in 2015, and allowed the MFA’s treasures to be presented in fresh, imaginative ways. Rarely seen works came out of storage and joined audience favorites. In 2017, the exterior of the building as well as the collection galleries were re-lit with LED lighting, and a reinstallation of European paintings in the Mackey Gallery transformed one of the most popular galleries at the Museum. Throughout its history, six talented directors have led the Museum: Rexford Stead, Lee Malone, Michael Milkovich, John Schloder, Kent Lydecker, and the current Executive Director, Kristen A. Shepherd. Ms. Shepherd is the youngest and the first female Executive Director of the Museum.

Mahaffey Theater

The Mahaffey Theater Duke Energy Center for the Performing Arts is a performing arts facility and concert hall centrally located on the downtown waterfront in St. Petersburg, Florida. The facility first opened in May 1965. The 2,031-seat facility features European box-style seating, elegant ballroom space and spectacular views of Tampa Bay. Just steps and minutes away from world-famous museums such as the Dali Museum and the Museum of Fine Arts and white sandy beaches, The Mahaffey hosts national and international artists and performances Broadway, classical, pop, rock, country, Americana/folk, jazz, comedy, dance and the renowned Florida Orchestra The Bill Edwards Foundation for the Arts, associated with the theater, supports the highly successful Class Acts program, which enables school children to experience the performing arts through in-theater performances as well as in-school outreach and extension programs..

Williams Park

Williams Park is a park located in St. Petersburg, Florida. It is the city's first park and encompasses an entire city block between 4th and 3rd Streets North and between 2nd and 1st Avenues North. Founded in 1888 and originally named "City Park," it was changed to Williams Park in honor of the founder of St. Petersburg, John Constantine Williams Sr.. The park is the center of the downtown business district and has been the venue for numerous political and civic rallies and celebrations for more than one hundred years. In 1964, Richard Nixon used the bandstand to speak to a large group gathered in the park on behalf of then presidential candidate Barry Goldwater. Many downtown workers flock to the park in good weather for picnics during their lunch breaks. At one time, the park was surrounded by prestigious department and retail stores. In the past 25 years, most of them have moved away to malls and other areas away from the city center. The bandstand plays a prominent role in the park and one has been there since 1894. The modern bandstand in the park was designed in 1954 by St. Petersburg architect William B. Harvard, whose work also includes the St. Petersburg Pier. In 1955 it was the recipient of the Award of Merit from the American Institute of Architects. It is used for outdoor concerts during the noon hour and on weekends, but for groups which tend to attract smaller crowds. Williams Park is now a major bus transfer point for the PSTA bus line. Williams Park is also known as the city's homeless park. Local residents, college students and shoppers no longer stroll the sidewalks or lounge on the landscaped lawn. Ongoing drug sweeps and police activity are now the features that mar this once prominent gathering place.

University of South Florida St. Petersburg

The University of South Florida St. Petersburg , commonly known as USF St. Pete, is a separately accredited institution in the University of South Florida System, located in downtown St. Petersburg, Florida by the Tampa Bay waterfront. As part of a multi-institutional system, USF St. Petersburg retains a separate identity and mission while contributing to and benefiting from the associations, cooperation, and shared resources of the USF System. The campus is bounded by the Salt Creek Marine District, Bayfront Medical Center and All Children's Hospital and the Roser Park and Bartlett Park residential neighborhoods. Opened in 1965 as a satellite campus of the University of South Florida, USFSP gained accreditation as a separate entity in 2006. USF St. Petersburg is the only public university in Pinellas County and the only public university offering bachelor's and graduate degree programs in the area. USF St. Petersburg enrolled nearly 5,000 students during the fall 2012 semester. Students across the USF System enroll at USF St. Petersburg, creating a typical semester student population of more than 6,000. The other separately accredited institutions in the System are the University of South Florida in Tampa, Florida and University of South Florida Sarasota-Manatee in Sarasota, Florida.

Shell Key Preserve

Shell Key Preserve is an 1,800-acre preserve located on Shell Key in Tierra Verde, Pinellas County in the U.S. state of Florida. The preserve protects sensitive marine habitats and includes one of the countys largest undeveloped barrier islands as well as numerous mangrove islands and expansive sea grass beds. Shell Key has been designated as one of the states most important areas for shorebird nesting and wintering and it serves as an important study area for these species. It also is an important area for recreation. A balance for both uses was established by restricting public use to the northern and southern ends of the island. A central core area for conservation is closed to the public. Boating, camping, and beach-going activities are permitted in public use areas of the preserve. Visitors can access Shell Key only via a water vessel and no restroom facilities are provided. The closest boat ramps, trailer parking, and restroom facilities are located at nearby at Fort De Soto Park.

Al Lang Stadium

Al Lang Stadium is a stadium in Downtown St. Petersburg, Florida, United States. Originally a baseball park, first built in 1947, reconstructed in 1976, and renovated in 1998, it was redesigned as a soccer venue in 2011. The facility is named in honor of Al Lang, a former mayor of St. Petersburg who was instrumental in bringing professional baseball to the city in the early twentieth century. For many decades, the stadium was the spring training home for a series Major League Baseball clubs and the summer home of their affiliated minor league teams. Tenants included the New York Yankees, St. Louis Cardinals, New York Mets, Baltimore Orioles, and Tampa Bay Rays, amongst others. The stadium hosted its last spring training game in 2008. Since 2011, it has served as the home field for the Tampa Bay Rowdies soccer club of the North American Soccer League.

Royal Theater (St. Petersburg, Florida)

The Royal Theater was a quonset hut style theater for African-American in St. Petersburg, Florida. It is located at 1011 22nd Street South and operated from 1948 to 1966. Designed by architect Philip F. Kennard for the Gulf Coast Entertainment Company, it was one of two movie theaters serving African-Americans during the era of segregation, the other was the Harlem Theater at 1019 Third Avenue South . Of the twelve public theaters outside of the African-American community only the LaPlaza Theater was not segregated. The theater closed a few years after desegregation and the Civil Rights Act 1964. By 1975 it was used as a youth center. The quonset hut design was developed by George A. Fuller construction company of New York which used a British prototype from the First World War called a "Nissen" hut. and were produced in a plant near Quonset, Rhode Island.

Mirror Lake Library

The St. Petersburg Public Library (also known as the Mirror Lake Community Library or Carnegie Library) is a Carnegie library built in 1915 in Beaux-Arts style. It was one of 10 Florida Carnegie libraries to receive grants awarded by the Carnegie Corporation of New York from 1901 to 1917. Steel magnate and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie provided funding for more than 3,000 Carnegie libraries in the United States, Canada, and Europe. The library is significant to the city's history as the first permanent home of the public library system and embodies the transformation of the city in the second decade of the twentieth century from a pioneer village to a city with viable cultural institutions. When the city was awarded the $17,500 grant in 1913, it was the culmination of a five-year pursuit by Councilman Ralph Veillard, W.L. Straub, owner of the St. Petersburg Times'm, and Annie McCrae, who became the first secretary of the library. The grant was approved by the city, and the site on the banks of the city Reservoir (now Mirror Lake) was chosen on July 17, 1914. The Mirror Lake Community Library is built in the Beaux-Arts style, with sculptural decoration along conservative modern lines, slightly overscaled details, bold sculptural supporting consoles, rich deep cornices, swags and sculptural enrichments. The Beaux- Arts style heavily influenced the architecture of the United States in the period from 1880 to 1920. The building's architect, Henry D. Whitfield worked for the Carnegie Corporation and designed this library, as well as many other Carnegie libraries in this style. The Junior League presented the city with their first Bookmobile in February 1949. On June 13, 1986, it was added to the U.S. National Register of Historic Places. Mirror Lake Community Library was St. Petersburg’s only library until the current Main library was built at 3745 9th Avenue in 1964.
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