Because the ability to travel is why we go to work
The Mirage today welcomed its newest addition to Siegfried & Roy’s Secret Garden and Dolphin Habitat - six-week-old white, white-striped and golden tiger cubs. The public will get its first chance to see these rare and adorable cubs in a special nursery created for them in the Secret Garden Friday, June 13, 2008, which happens to be Siegfried’s 69th birthday.
The Mirage welcomes tiger cubs to Siegfried & Roy’s Secret Garden & Dolphin Habitat
Las Vegas is in a crappy geographical location, surrounded by desert, water is scarce and nearly everything needs to be trucked or piped in. With the influx of new construction one has to wonder if the Vegas money men are thinking towards the future, hopefully trying to secure Las Vegas as a quasi-environmentally aware oasis in the desert or just the wasteful wonderland many perceive it to be. I was surprised to find out that “The Palazzo”, the new luxury tower in the Venetian empire earned itself the silver LEED certification in green building, making it the largest “green” building in the world. The more investments into green tourism the better, and this type of movement towards green building will hopefully continue to spread across Vegas and beyond.
The Palazzo Las Vegas, a Las Vegas Sands Corp. (NYSE: LVS) property, announced that the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) made its “green” status official with the presentation of a Silver LEED(R) Certificate (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) at an award ceremony held today. Nevada Governor Jim Gibbons and David E. Rodgers, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Energy Efficiency at the U.S. Department of Energy were also on-hand to honor this impressive accomplishment.
The Palazzo employs such effective environmentally-efficient technologies that it conserves enough water to provide each Nevada citizen with 266 eight-ounce glasses of water for a year and saves enough energy to light a 100 watt light bulb for 12,100 years. It even promotes alternative modes of transportation by offering valet parking-for bicycles. Key features that contribute to The Palazzo’s tremendous conservation include:
– Artificial turf, drip irrigation and moisture sensors in planted areas
result in over a 75% reduction in irrigation needs.
– Swimming pools at The Palazzo are heated with an expansive solar pool
heating system. In the summer, the excess solar energy not needed for
the pools is directed to the hotel’s hot water system, reducing the
need to heat water for guest suites.
– Air conditioning controls in guest suites that automatically setback by
several degrees when guests are not present and reset to the desired
temperature upon return.
– Team member service areas equipped with lighting occupancy sensors that
shut off lights when no one is in the area.
– Interior plumbing fixtures use 37% less water than conventional
buildings as a result of water-efficient showerheads, high efficiency
toilets and low-flow lavatory faucet aerators.
– Moisture sensors monitor real time, site specific air temperature,
humidity, rainfall and other factors to provide daily watering cycle
adjustment.
– A waste recycling program implemented from demolition through
completion diverted over 70% of waste from the landfill.
– The building’s structural steel averaged 95% recycled content, while
the concrete averaged a 26% recycled content rate.
The Palazzo Las Vegas Named Largest ‘Green’ Building in the World
Thanks to the magic of Youtube (w00t Youtube!), I got to see the only part of the Grammy’s I was interested in. The show was highlighted by a brief performance of the Beatles “A Day in the Life” from the Cirque du Soleil show “Love” shown in the Mirage hotel in Las Vegas. The Grammy’s version of the Cirque show didn’t really capture how absolutely wonderful the Las Vegas version is.
My wife and I got to see “Love” on it’s first “test” night, completely by luck (well actually it was due to the ineptitude of Frontier airlines). Two weeks prior to our vacation Frontier notified us that our Friday flight had been bumped to the next morning. We went into frantic mode because we generally don’t stay in Vegas over the weekend due to the extreme bounces in hotel prices (or in our case our hotel was sold out for that night). After finding a suitable replacement, I discovered that the first ever public showing of “Love” was going to be going on that Friday, and surprisingly I was able to grab two tickets. So in the end it worked out for the best. To folks heading to Vegas, I can’t say enough about how wonderful this show is, definitely one of the best stage shows I’d ever seen.
(Cross posted over at Brian Kirsten’s Blog)
It seems The Venetian hotel has received the Five Diamond triple AAA rating, making it the largest hotel in the United States to get the award. Since I haven’t frequented any of The Venetian’s rooms I can’t be a judge on whether or not the hotel deserved the award. I can say anytime I’ve visited Venetian, I haven’t hated it, although it seems a bit more “plastic” than advertised. Visiting the Wynn next door you can see where they spent their money, on details and creating their own “concept” and making it realistic by using the materials you would expect in a $2 billion plus hotel. In Venetian they seemed to have spent their money on the “huge-ness” of it all, with gondolas floating in a neon blue canal. I did hear they’ve ton a bunch of renovations in the hotel so things might have changed since my last visit. Either way a big congrats to Venetian and it’s staff, earning the 5 Diamond rating probably isn’t all that easy, and keeping is probably going to be tougher.
From the press release:
The Venetian Resort-Hotel-Casino, one of the world’s premier destination resort hotels, has been awarded the esteemed AAA Five Diamond Award for 2008 — a distinction which makes it the largest property in the country to have received the award.
The AAA Five Diamond Award for hotels and restaurants is North America’s most coveted symbol of excellence in the hospitality industry. The independent association defines Five Diamond properties as establishments that reflect the characteristics of the ultimate in luxury and sophistication, and accommodations that are first class.
Picture by adpowers
Hard Rock has announced the opening of a new flagship cafe and store right on the strip itself. The cafe’s new location will be in the Showcase Mall just north of the MGM Grand. The original location by the Hard Rock hotel will stay put, Hard Rock believes with the new growth on the strip the market will sustain two restaurants. I think this is a great idea for Hard Rock, the restaurant they’ve got over by the hotel (which by the way you should never walk to in the heat of the day from the strip) kind of misses the action of not being closer to the strip. I hope the owners of the Showcase Mall has given it a face lift since the last time I was in Vegas. All I can remember of the place is crappy tourist shops and M&M world.
Scheduled to open in summer 2009, the new Hard Rock Cafe Las Vegas will be one of the city’s premier dining and entertainment destinations, with three floors and more than 41,000-square feet of space, including a 700-seat restaurant, live concert venue and Hard Rock’s largest Rock Shop. In addition to a state-of-the-art facility, the cafe will also feature rock ‘n’ roll memorabilia from Hard Rock’s unmatched collection. The Showcase Mall Phase III is being developed by City Center Retail, LLC, a San Francisco-based development company, and Angelo Gordon & Co., a New York-based investment firm.
New Frontier To Be Imploded November 13th [Two Way Hard Three]
Everybody, suit up! Vegas pools rock [LA Times]
The Luxor To Get De-Egypted [Luxist]
SHINING KNIGHTS AND AMOUR IN ‘SPAMALOT’ [San Francisco Chronicle]
Gunman Fires Shots Inside New York, New York Casino [HotelChatter]
Boyd Gaming officially began construction of it’s $4.8 billion Echelon resort project, taking up the spot where the recently imploded Stardust stood. The project will contain 5 hotels surrounding a vast entertainment and casino complex.
Echelon’s five hotels will all have separate entrances and lobbies. But the entire development, including the 140,000-square-foot casino, the meeting space and retail promenade, will be interconnected. A guest, conceivably, could walk the entire facility without ever venturing outside.
“The idea was to create different experiences and environments for the guest,” said Echelon President and Chief Executive Officer Bob Boughner, who is overseeing the project. Boughner, a longtime Boyd Gaming executive, headed construction and development of Borgata before heading back to Las Vegas last year.
STRIP DEVELOPMENT: Echelon gets off to cool start [Las Vegas Review-Journal]
(Title quote from the Samuel Taylor Coleridge poem.)
“Hotels are trending toward having more suites,” says Bjorn Hanson, a principal in the Hospitality and Leisure Practice at PricewaterhouseCoopers. “The economy is strong, corporate travel budgets aren’t in a period of restriction, and it adds more sexiness to a hotel to have an extravagant room.”
From a 9,000 square foot two story suite in The Palms that includes access to a cantilevered Jacuzzi with clear views of the Strip, a butler, poker table, private gym and media room (for a mere $25,000 a night!) to a $13,000 a night Royal Suite in the Burj Al Arab, hotels love adding the glamour. And the funny thing, is that most of these expensive suites are usually complementary, but they aren’t given to regular schmoes. Usually those on the receiving end of those free suites are dignitaties, stars, and the most important, folks who plan on spending a ton of money at the hotel they’re staying at (casinos most times).
Vegas has gone back to its beginnings. Not the Bugsy Siegel ones, but the Stone Age ones.On June 8, the city opened the most unlikely of attractions: the Las Vegas Springs Preserve.
The 180-acre tract about four miles northwest of the Strip marks the spot where a natural spring helped give the city its name (”the meadows,” in Spanish). Though the spring all but dried up half a century ago, it’s now the heart of a new non-gaming attraction that aspires to be the Central Park of Las Vegas.
I’m going to be heading over to Vegas in November and me and the wife love hitting new places in Vegas. This should be a great place to check out away from all the hustle of the strip.
Interesting article on the history of Wynn (prior and new hotels) design philosophy, as well as a breakdown of the opulence of the Wynn’s (hotel) Villas.
“I never looked at the price tag of anything when I was designing the villas,” maintains Thomas. “We looked at it in terms of what was going to make the experience more phenomenal. If we can make our guests feel a heightened sense of romance and drama and comfort, along with every convenience within fingertip reach, that’s what it’s all about.” God is in the details. Barrel vaulted, domed and coffered ceilings, for instance, that are 12 feet high—“like the great private spaces in Paris or Rome.” Floors that are clad in handpicked onyx and handwoven carpets. Walls upholstered in hand-embroidered fabric. Showers with heated mirrors set in slabs of marble, closets lined in macassar ebony and silk. The touch of a button summons the butler, adjusts the room temperature (or lighting), closes the draperies, activates the spa jets or makes the flat screen TV pop up in the bar or at the foot of the bed.
Villas at Wynn Las Vegas with Roger Thomas [Architectural Digest]
(Link courtesy of Two Way Hard Three)
The largest casino downtown, along with a sister Golden Nugget in Laughlin, is managing to turn a profit for its corporate owners.
In a limited statement to investors Thursday, Houston-based Landry’s, the Golden Nugget’s corporate parent, reported the casinos made $21 million in profit in the first quarter of 2007 that ended March 31, compared to $16.3 million in the same period last year. Revenue was $70.7 million, up from $63.4 million in the first quarter of 2006.
I’ve only visited the Fremont (Downtown/old Vegas) area once in our many trips to Vegas. It’s area is filled with fried oreos, $0.50 roulette, lots of overhead blinking lights and all the touristy crap you would imagine, so it’s great to hear that one of the older Vegas casinos is doing so well.
A glimmer of gold for downtown [Las Vegas Review-Journal]
Opened in November, Caesars Palace’s Qua Baths and Spa has treatments for all your ailments, including if you so desire, a room where it snows year round.
Qua’s ice room, the only one of its kind in the United States, comes from the millennia-old European bathing tradition of using snow to cleanse the body, said Don Genders, a partner of Eurospa Technologies LLC, the room’s creator. Ice is available in the room for those who want to rub it on steaming skin.
I guess the idea is going from a hot sauna to a cold room is invigorating, and might also provide “healthful” benefits. I like to “spa” as much as the next person, but the idea of standing in my skivvies while being snowed on isn’t all that appealing to me.
Year-round snow in Las Vegas? [MSNBC]
