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Las Vegas Casino Resort
Wynn Las Vegas, built at a cost of US$2.7 billion,
is a casino resort on the Las Vegas Strip, in Las Vegas,
Nevada. The resort is named after casino developer Steve
Wynn. It is the flagship property of Wynn Resorts Limited.
The 2,716 rooms range in size from
620 square feet (58 m²) to the villas at 7,000
square feet (650 m²).
Wynn Las Vegas is one of the tallest
buildings in Las Vegas, towering 50 stories over the
Las Vegas Strip. It is located at Las Vegas Boulevard
South and Sands Avenue, across from the Fashion Show
Mall.
The property features a 111,000 ft²
(10,200 m²) casino, a 3 acre (12,000 m²) lake,
18 restaurants and bars, 26 retail outlets in 76,000
square feet (7,000 m²) of space, one of which is
a Ferrari-Maserati dealership, an art gallery, and two
wedding chapels. A convention center with 223,000 ft²
(20,700 m²) of space is also available.
In a departure from the previous
trend of providing free sidewalk attractions to draw
in customers, the Wynn Las Vegas is constructed so that
visitors must enter the site to view the free attractions.
The main feature is large, flat waterfall stationed
behind the mountain, running into a small "lake",
both of which have images displayed on them to produce
a unique show on the hour, every hour, starting at some
point in the afternoon.
The historic Desert Inn Golf Course
was rebuilt while the hotel was being constructed. The
new course, the only one on the Las Vegas Strip, was
designed by Steve Wynn and Tom Fazio, who previously
worked together on the Shadow Creek Golf Club, also
in Las Vegas. Called the "Wynn Golf and Country
Club", use of the course is restricted to hotel
guests at a cost of $500 per round.
History
The site was assembled by buying the
Desert Inn Hotel and Golf course for most of the land.
The remainder was acquired by purchasing private residences
that were generally located along Paradise Avenue. While
some owners sold early on, others held out. This resulted
in numerous legal actions between the various parties.
In the end, the site acquired totaled 215 acres (870,000
m²).
The initial commercial for the hotel
aired in some local spots during the 2005 Super Bowl.
The commercial stands out in that Wynn stood atop the
edge of his tall building (with a helicopter a few feet
away).
Wynn Las Vegas opened on April 28,
2005, Wynn's wife's birthday.
Attractions
Nightclubs are an important part of
the resort, as are theaters housing several production
shows.
One production show is Avenue Q, which
enjoyed considerable success on Broadway.
The other production show is a new,
1 million gallon water-oriented production, entitled
"Le Rêve" (the original name of the
resort project), designed by Franco Dragone. No seat
is more than 40 feet (12 m) from the stage for this
production. Dragone was a director of Cirque du Soleil
and creator of Céline Dion's "A New Day"
at Caesars Palace. Although not a Cirque du Soleil production,
"Le Rêve" shares many of the characteristics
usually associated with a Cirque du Soleil show.
The resort holds much of Wynn's considerable
art collection, which was largely removed from the Bellagio
following the merger of MGM Grand, Inc. and Mirage Resorts,
Inc. in 2000. The collection, which focuses primarily
on 19th and 20th-century works by European and American
artists, includes masterpieces by Édouard Manet,
Andy Warhol, Vincent van Gogh, Paul Cezanne, and Paul
Gauguin, among others. The centerpiece of the collection
is "Le Rêve," the Pablo Picasso portrait
that was the resort's original namesake. Wynn reportedly
purchased the painting for $42 million, one of the highest
prices ever paid for a Picasso. The collection was on
display at the Nevada Museum of Art in Reno while the
Wynn Las Vegas was being constructed and was installed
in the resort shortly before it was opened.
Inspiration and vision
Wynn purchased the Desert Inn hotel
and casino to obtain property for his future dreams.
The Desert Inn was imploded to make room for his new
hotel project. The first name assigned to the hotel
was Le Rêve. Along the way, Wynn Resorts Limited
was formed and continued development with Wynn being
the controlling stock holder.
Wynn has stated that the major shift
with this new resort is the concept of designing from
the "inside out." In contrast to his previous
hotels Bellagio and The Mirage, there is no Las Vegas
Strip attraction to draw in the gawkers. Instead, visitors
must venture inside to see what the hotel is all about.
Wynn has said that "there is no franchise in a
casual observer, there is a franchise in a guest."
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