Explore the real-world places that appear in The Color of Death by Ann Maxwell. Each location on the map shows what happens there in the novel, the real history of the place, and what's there today. Featured locations include St. Petersburg Gem Exchange District, Tampa International Airport, FBI Tampa Field Office, Kate Chandler's Studio and Apartment, Vinoy Park Hotel and 8 more.
Downtown St. Petersburg — Site of the sapphire transfer
This is the heart of Kate Chandler's world — the district where the catastrophic transfer of seven rare, priceless blue sapphires was arranged. Kate had been commissioned for the opportunity of a lifetime: to cut the extraordinary gems and establish her reputation as a world-class jewel cutter. When the transfer goes fatally wrong, the sapphires vanish and her half-brother Lee disappears, setting the entire deadly chain of events in motion.
St. Petersburg developed a modest but real gemstone and jewelry trade corridor in its downtown district, supported by the city's growth as a retirement and luxury goods destination throughout the mid-to-late 20th century. The downtown area has historically served as a commercial hub for high-end goods along Central Avenue.
Downtown St. Petersburg has been substantially revitalized with galleries, boutiques, and specialty shops. The Central Arts District includes jewelers and artisan craft businesses along Central Avenue and the surrounding streets.
Visit: St. Petersburg Arts District (landmark)
4100 George J. Bean Pkwy, Tampa — Arrival and FBI surveillance point
Tampa International Airport serves as a critical transit and surveillance node in the novel. FBI Special Agent Sam Groves and his elite crime strike force monitor incoming and outgoing passengers as they scramble to track Kate Chandler and the missing sapphires. The airport represents the threshold of the conspiracy — the point at which federal agents suspect Kate of orchestrating a sophisticated bait-and-switch jewel heist and begin closing their net around her.
Tampa International Airport opened in 1971 and was considered revolutionary in airport design, featuring a unique airside-landside concept with automated people movers. It has consistently ranked among the top airports in the United States for passenger satisfaction.
Tampa International Airport remains one of the busiest airports in the southeastern United States, serving millions of passengers annually. A major expansion program was completed in recent years, adding new concourses, rental car facilities, and ground transportation options.
Visit: Tampa International Airport (landmark)
5525 West Gray Street, Tampa — Headquarters of Sam Groves's operation
The FBI's Tampa Field Office is the operational base for Special Agent Sam Groves and his elite crime strike force as they investigate the sapphire theft and hunt for Kate Chandler. Here, agents build their case that Kate is the criminal mastermind of a bait-and-switch scheme, marshaling surveillance footage, financial records, and informant testimony. Sam struggles internally with the assignment — something about Kate and the evidence doesn't add up, even as his superiors pressure him to bring her in.
The FBI established a presence in Tampa in the early 20th century, with the field office growing substantially through the Cold War and drug interdiction eras of the 1980s and 1990s. The Tampa division covers a broad territory including the Tampa Bay metro area and surrounding counties.
The FBI Tampa Field Office continues to operate as a major regional hub for federal law enforcement, handling organized crime, cybercrime, public corruption, and violent crime investigations across the Central Florida Gulf Coast region.
St. Petersburg Arts District — Kate's home and gem-cutting workspace
Kate's combined live-work studio is where her expertise as a world-class jewel cutter is established. The space is filled with precision cutting equipment, magnifying loupes, and the tools of her exacting trade. When news reaches her that the sapphire transfer has gone wrong and Lee has vanished, the studio becomes the place she frantically tries to piece together what happened before federal agents arrive at her door, forcing her to flee and become a fugitive.
The St. Petersburg Arts District, anchored along the 600 block of Central Avenue and surrounding streets, developed as an artist live-work enclave in the 1980s and 1990s. The city actively promoted studio spaces and artisan residences to cultivate a creative economy downtown.
The arts district remains a vibrant part of St. Petersburg's identity, with galleries, studios, and creative businesses lining several city blocks. The area hosts frequent art walks and is considered one of the most successful arts districts in Florida.
Visit: St. Petersburg Arts District (landmark)
501 5th Ave NE, St. Petersburg — Luxury venue and meeting point
The grand Vinoy Hotel serves as a backdrop for the high-stakes world of rare gem dealing in the novel — the sort of luxurious, visible venue where wealthy collectors, brokers, and dealers conduct business under the guise of social elegance. The hotel's waterfront setting and opulent interior represent the glittering surface of the gem trade that conceals the violent criminal conspiracy beneath it. Sam Groves uses contacts in the hospitality industry to track movements of persons of interest.
The Vinoy Park Hotel opened in 1925 during Florida's great land boom and was a playground for the wealthy elite. After decades of decline, the hotel was meticulously restored and reopened in 1992 as the Renaissance Vinoy Resort, listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Now operating as the Vinoy Renaissance St. Petersburg Resort & Golf Club, the hotel remains one of the premier luxury accommodations on Florida's Gulf Coast. Its pink Mediterranean Revival exterior is one of the most photographed landmarks in St. Petersburg.
Visit: Vinoy Renaissance St. Petersburg Resort & Golf Club (historic site)
1 Dali Blvd, St. Petersburg — Public landmark near the conspiracy's edge
The waterfront area surrounding the Dali Museum serves as a location where Kate, attempting to evade both FBI surveillance and the ruthless assassin pursuing her, moves through the tourist crowds hoping to disappear. The museum's publicly visible location along the waterfront provides the kind of anonymous cover a fugitive needs. The novel uses the contrast between the world of art and beauty and the violent conspiracy swirling around Kate to heighten dramatic tension.
The Salvador Dali Museum in St. Petersburg houses the largest collection of Dali's works outside of Europe, thanks to the collecting efforts of A. Reynolds and Eleanor Morse. The collection was moved to St. Petersburg in 1982, and a stunning new building designed by Yann Weymouth opened in 2011.
The Dali Museum is one of Florida's top cultural attractions, drawing hundreds of thousands of visitors annually. The building's geodesic glass bubble — called the 'Enigma' — is itself an architectural landmark on the St. Petersburg waterfront.
Visit: The Dali Museum (museum)
Gulf Shore Drive, St. Pete Beach — Coastal flight and pursuit
The beach communities along the Gulf Coast become a terrain of pursuit as Kate flees both federal agents and the assassin whose orders are to ensure she doesn't live to talk. The flat, exposed geography of St. Pete Beach offers little true cover — every motel, parking lot, and stretch of sand is a potential trap. Sam Groves, increasingly conflicted about the case, begins closing in on Kate not to arrest her but because he senses she is in mortal danger from forces more dangerous than the FBI.
St. Pete Beach developed as a resort community in the 1920s and 1930s, and became one of Florida's most popular beach destinations in the postwar era. The long barrier island strip is lined with hotels, motels, and vacation rentals that have served tourists for nearly a century.
St. Pete Beach remains a major Gulf Coast tourist destination known for its white sand beaches and calm waters. The Don CeSar Hotel, a pink landmark built in 1928, anchors the south end of the beach and remains one of Florida's most iconic resort properties.
Visit: St. Pete Beach (park)
Channelside Drive, Tampa — Import/export nexus for gem smuggling
The Port of Tampa represents the point of entry and exit for the criminal conspiracy at the heart of the novel. The seven rare sapphires, originally sourced internationally, passed through commercial freight systems connected to the port. Investigators working with Sam Groves trace shipping manifests and cargo records here as they try to unravel a smuggling and fraud operation that goes far beyond the original gem theft, revealing layers of organized criminality.
The Port of Tampa Bay has been one of Florida's major commercial ports since the late 19th century, originally built on the phosphate trade. By the 21st century it became the largest port in Florida by tonnage, handling cruise ships, petroleum, and bulk cargo.
The Port of Tampa Bay remains one of the busiest ports in the southeastern United States. The nearby Channelside District has been developed for public use with restaurants, entertainment venues, and the Florida Aquarium adjacent to the working port.
Visit: Florida Aquarium (landmark)
7th Avenue, Tampa — Underground contacts and dangerous meetings
Ybor City's dense, historic streets and layered criminal underworld provide cover for the conspiracy's foot soldiers. Kate, following her only leads toward Lee's disappearance, ventures into this neighborhood to meet a contact who may know what happened to her half-brother. The meeting goes dangerously wrong, confirming that the conspiracy reaches into Tampa's street-level criminal networks. Sam Groves, tracking Kate, is forced to confront the possibility that she is a victim, not a perpetrator.
Ybor City was founded in 1885 by cigar manufacturer Vicente Martinez-Ybor and became the cigar-rolling capital of the world, with a vibrant multiethnic Cuban, Spanish, and Italian community. After the industry declined, the neighborhood fell into neglect before being revived as an entertainment district in the 1990s.
Ybor City is now a National Historic Landmark District and Tampa's most distinctive nightlife and dining neighborhood. The Columbia Restaurant, Florida's oldest restaurant founded in 1905, remains a centerpiece of the district and a major tourist attraction.
Visit: Ybor City State Museum (museum)
Treasure Island, Florida — Where the trail of Kate's half-brother goes cold
Treasure Island is where Kate traces Lee's last known movements before the sapphire transfer collapsed into violence and disappearance. A rented safe house here was supposed to be the interim holding point for the gems before final delivery. When Kate arrives — evading FBI surveillance — she finds signs of a violent struggle: overturned furniture, traces of blood, and no Lee. This discovery transforms the investigation from a theft case into what Kate fears most: a murder.
Treasure Island is a barrier island community that developed primarily in the postwar resort boom of the 1950s and 1960s. Its name derives from legends of buried Spanish treasure and pirate activity along the Gulf Coast, which attracted early settlers and developers alike.
Treasure Island is a quiet residential beach community with a small commercial district along Gulf Blvd. It borders St. Pete Beach to the south and Madeira Beach to the north, and retains a laid-back, mid-century Florida character compared to more developed resort towns.
SR-60 over Old Tampa Bay — High-speed pursuit route
The Courtney Campbell Causeway — the long, exposed bridge connecting Tampa to Clearwater over Old Tampa Bay — serves as the setting for one of the novel's most tense pursuit sequences. With nowhere to turn and the causeway's open water on both sides, Kate is boxed in while the assassin closes the distance. Sam Groves races to intercept before the fatal order can be carried out, the flat Florida geography turning a simple road into a killing ground with no exits.
The Courtney Campbell Causeway, officially State Road 60, was originally built in the 1930s and reconstructed multiple times. It runs approximately 8.5 miles across Old Tampa Bay, making it one of the longer causeways in Florida. The causeway is named after a local Florida politician.
The Courtney Campbell Causeway is a major commuter route between Tampa and Clearwater. It also features a recreational trail running its length, popular with cyclists and walkers, and includes a public beach area at the Clearwater end.
Visit: Courtney Campbell Causeway Trail (park)
249 Windward Passage, Clearwater — Final confrontation waterfront
The waterfront at Clearwater serves as the setting for the novel's climactic confrontation. Kate, cornered and running out of moves, finally reaches an understanding with Sam Groves — convincing him that she is the target, not the criminal, and that the real conspiracy is far larger and more lethal than his superiors have acknowledged. The chilling voice from the threatening phone calls belongs to the assassin who is now in plain sight. Sam and Kate's alliance, forged in desperation, is the only thing standing between her and the order that has already been given.
Clearwater Beach and its surrounding waterfront developed as a major resort destination in the early 20th century. The area around Clearwater Harbor has been a commercial and recreational center for Pinellas County for over a hundred years, with deep ties to the fishing and boating industries.
The Clearwater waterfront is one of the busiest tourist destinations on Florida's Gulf Coast. Clearwater Beach consistently ranks among the top beaches in the United States, and the Clearwater Marine Aquarium — home of Winter the dolphin — is one of the area's most visited attractions.
Visit: Clearwater Marine Aquarium (museum)
580 5th Ave S, Naples / Miami connection — Authentication and provenance
The Gemological Institute of America's Florida connections become critical to the plot when investigators attempt to authenticate and trace the provenance of the seven rare sapphires. Kate, whose expertise as a cutter means she understands the gems' unique characteristics better than anyone, provides detailed descriptions to Sam Groves that help authenticate what was stolen. The paper trail connecting the sapphires to their origin reveals the first solid evidence of the international conspiracy behind the heist.
The Gemological Institute of America, founded in 1931, is the world's foremost authority on diamonds, colored stones, and pearls. The GIA developed the internationally recognized grading system for diamonds and maintains laboratories and educational campuses around the world, with a significant presence in Florida due to the state's active gem and jewelry trade.
The GIA operates laboratories, educational centers, and alumni networks across the United States. The organization's grading reports are considered the gold standard of gem certification worldwide, and its alumni and affiliated gemologists are active throughout Florida's jewelry industry.
More by Ann Maxwell: All Ann Maxwell books
Other nearby maps: Conflicted Home by A. American locations map