What does Key West look like? And we answer it every time a proposed renovation or major development project drop its AI-generated drawings, “But that doesn’t look like Key West.” I’m of the mind that Key West looks exactly like what we are, a weirdly cobbled together accumulation of architecture that changed each time residents felt flush with cash and an itch to expand.

You can stick up all the signs you want, even change U.S. maps, and folks are still going to call it the way they learned it. Take that quarter-mile concrete pier at the end of Key West’s White Street. Rebranded in June 2016 as the Edward B. Knight Pier, it remains the White Street Pier. Humans ain’t much fond of changing up words just for the heck of it. So what do we do with Old and New Publix?