South Beach: Florida's gayest beach district gets yet another second wind.

Just as the revived charms of South Miami Beach started seeming a tad tired following the go-go 1990s and the post-9/11 doldrums, this sexy, glamorous slice of quintessential beach city has managed to evolve and reaffirm its spell once again over sunseekers, glamour hounds, celebrities, and muscle boys from the world over. Pedestrian Lincoln Road, with its eateries, boutiques, and circus of humanity strolling, biking, and Rollerblading; the chicly rehabbed deco hotels of Collins Avenue; the bars and clubs of Washington Avenue; and that famous white beach along iconic pastel-hued Ocean Drive-they're all pumpin' harder than ever.

By now, the riches-to-rags-and-back-again saga of South Beach is familiar to many. The areas first real boom got rolling in the Mafia-fueled Roaring Twenties, and all those sophisticated art deco buildings of the 1930s were built for a Jewish clientele driven uptown. By the '70s the deteriorating deco district had become known as "God's waiting room," full of old folks, crime, and drugs. Preservationists and farsighted developers launched a heroic revival in the late '80s, with an assist from NBC's Miami Vice, and voile, a sun- and sex-soaked hot spot was born, christened South Beach.

Reinvention continued unabated in 1990s South Beach, now notorious as home to the planet's wildest, most innovative nightlife (as one newspaper recently put it, "when drag queens ruled the world") and an avalanche of painfully trendy eateries and boutique hotels. In this wild decade the mayor was jailed, Versace was shot, and Nathan Lane and Robin Williams limp-wristed it as Ocean Drive drag club owners in The Birdcage.

After a short slump, South Beach has come roaring back yet again. These days it's a year-round area with an increasingly stable population of permanent residents. Still, tourists abound, and even in sticky August we locals are inundated with Europeans enjoying their monthlong vacations and strong currency. Some residents will tell you the old magic is gone, but there's still plenty of nightlife in places like Mansion, Opium Garden/Prive, Crobar, Amika, and Sky Bar. Hiphop is heard now more often than techno/house, and there's been a move toward low-key lounges and stylish hotel bars. The hotel and restaurant landscape is much improved in depth, service, and quality, and the art scene has received a major boost from the Art Basal festival and the recently expanded Bass Museum of Art.

In queer-bar land, Twist, which has grooved for over a decade on Washington Avenue, has been joined by Score on Lincoln Road and nearby lesbian-popular Laundry Bar. During the day Ocean Drive's Palace Bar and Grill pulls in boys from across the way--the gay beach at 12th Street. And Little Havana, across the causeway, serves up hot Latin gay clubs Azticar and La Rumba.

Gay circuit parties have long been held here--the White Party in November, the Winter Party in March--but those iconic gay events are now complemented by cultural gatherings ranging from the South Beach Wine and Food Festival to the Latin Grammy Awards.

Madonna and Sly Stallone are long gone, but now we've got Jennifer Lopez, Miami Heat player Shaquille O'Neal, the inexplicable Paris Hilton, Anna Kournikova and squeeze Enrique Iglesias, Uma Thurman, the queens from Queer Eye, Beyonce, Kanye West, and many more. And the buzz is likely to keep growing--an updated Miami Vice hits movie screens next summer, and UPN is planning a mid-season show called South Beach. Yet for all the glitz and hype, this town now attracts a wide range of visitors both gay and straight, from high-school hip-hoppers to aging suburbanites. If you're not a supermodel, major leaguer, or movie star, no biggie--in today's diverse SoBe, there really is room for everyone.