American Hotspots Bridge Beach-Club Gap

LOS ANGELES (TheStreet) -- Known for their waterfront dining rooms and Rose-induced tanning scene, St. Tropez beach clubs like Club 55 and La Voile Rouge revel in summertime excess.

These lavish leisure spots lure a moneyed American, Middle Eastern and European clientele that don't blink an eye at $1,500 lunches and $2,000 bottles of Champagne -- all before noon. But given that America is home to some of the world's best beaches, from Main Street Beach in East Hampton to Zuma Beach in Malibu, why in the world don't we have anything quite as fun in the United States?

With strict real estate laws that limit commercial access to prime strips of waterfront, and a far-more conservative relationship with alcohol consumption near public beaches, America has a hard time competing with its European peers in seaside extravagance. But that doesn't mean no one is trying. Here are a few hotspots new and old attempting to bridge the beach-club gap.

The birthplace of the Beach Boys and Malibu Barbie, Southern California has long been the epicenter of surfer society. But visitors looking for colorful umbrellas and frilly drinks have few options: just a handful of waterfront sit-down eateries and hotels like the Casa del Mar and Malibu Beach Inn. Recently, however, the owner of L.A.'s SLS Hotel and exclusive Hyde Lounge signed an agreement to revamp one of the city's most iconic waterfront properties, Gladstone's.

Montauk's Navy Beach is Long Island's answer to St. Tropez beach chic.

The beloved tourist institution has been sending customers home with fried fish dinners in swan-shaped tinfoil doggy bags for years. With a one-of-a-kind waterfront location at the tributary of Sunset Boulevard, Gladstone's will be transformed into a dazzling new venue -- likely the closest thing L.A. will have to a St. Tropez-style beach club. A massive outdoor terrace overlooks the Pacific with a great tanning beach, despite the mostly frigid Pacific water. And the interior of rounded booths and diner-style decor is also slated to get a facelift, with the help of SBE's favorite designer, Philippe Starck.

On the opposite coast at the tip of Long Island, Montauk's Navy Beach is located on a 200-foot strip of white-sand beach offering a renovated restaurant and beach bar in time for the summer 2010 season. The restaurant neighbors two Naval piers formerly occupied by the U.S. military and now open for New York oligarchs to moor their 150-foot Azimuts. Inside, Gilligan's Island meets Ralph Lauren in a chichi nautical dining room. Navy blue lacquered tabletops complement white paneled walls under a rustic beam ceiling with vintage wooden windows that overlook the tumbling waves. Walls are strewn with the melancholy remnants of '50s beach culture, with Esther Williams snapshots, swim goggles and Naval artwork.