The DeMarcay

Palm Avenue is the kind of street that rewards walking slowly — a short run of art galleries, antique dealers and cafés between Main Street and the bayfront that has anchored downtown Sarasota's cultural life for a century. The DeMarcay belongs to that story twice. The 18-story tower at 33 S. Palm Ave. occupies the site of the DeMarcay Hotel, a Mission Revival building that broke ground in 1922, opened in 1924 and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1984. When Chicago-based GK Real Estate redeveloped the property, the historic facades of the hotel and the neighboring Roth Cigar Factory were prepared for preservation and incorporated into the design, salvaged tin ceiling tiles and interior doors were saved, and the original hotel sign was restored and donated to Visit Sarasota County's downtown visitor center. What rose behind that frontage is a genuinely boutique building: 39 residences designed by Sarasota architecture firm Parker Walter Group and built by Voeller Construction, completed in 2023, capped by a rooftop amenity level with views across the bayfront. For buyers weighing downtown's larger towers, The DeMarcay offers a different proposition — small resident count, a storied address and the gallery district at the front door.

With 39 homes spread across 18 floors, The DeMarcay averages just a few residences per level. Floor plans span one-, two- and three-bedroom layouts, many with dens, ranging from roughly 1,100 to more than 3,400 square feet, with penthouse plans beginning on the 13th floor. During presales, some buyers combined homes into larger custom residences — including a two-level home spanning the 15th and 16th floors with its own private elevator. Interiors were finished with 10- to 11-foot ceilings, floor-to-ceiling windows, custom Italian cabinetry and quartz surfaces, and buyers in later phases could customize finishes and colors. Nearly every residence carries private outdoor space, with balconies and terraces oriented toward Sarasota Bay, the marina or the downtown skyline; sales materials noted upper-floor sightlines reaching toward Siesta Key and Longboat Key.

The building's shared spaces are concentrated where the views are — at the top. The rooftop amenity level includes a heated saltwater pool, an outdoor kitchen, terrace seating and a club room with bay and city panoramas, alongside a fitness center on the 18th floor. Service is a defining feature for a building this size: The DeMarcay was marketed with 24/7 concierge staffing and valet parking, and residents have secure covered parking with electric-vehicle charging available. The scale keeps things quiet — with 39 homes, the rooftop rarely has to be shared with a crowd.

Days here organize themselves around the street below. Morning coffee on Main Street, a look through whatever a Palm Avenue gallery has hung that week, an afternoon walk along the marina seawall at Bayfront Park. Evenings might mean a performance at the Sarasota Opera House, dinner in Burns Court, or nothing more ambitious than the rooftop pool at sunset, when the sky over the bay does the entertaining. The Saturday ritual is the downtown farmers market; the Sunday one might be a slow morning at Selby Gardens among the orchids and banyans. It is a compact life, in the best sense — most of it reachable without touching a car key.