CityCenter Las Vegas

Sweet Temptations: Valentine's Day At City Center, Las Vegas

Filed under: Dining, Jewelry, Luxury Travel & Hotels, Spirits

I have written about City Center, Las Vegas in Luxist before, the last column was on the many the New Year's Eve celebrations. Because of those, I thought New Year's was surely the city's most attractive holiday. Silly me! I now realize that Valentine's Day contains as much or more of the sybaritic Las Vegas DNA than New Year's. New Year's defines new beginnings, but Valentine's Day? It's about risk-taking -- in romance, infatuation, and sensuality -- essentially carpe diem-ing (seizing the day) in excelsius (in the highest manner) for at least 24 hours.

So here, in honor of St. Valentinus, Patron Saint of love, young people, and joyous marriage, is an image of a Tabu Lounge Chocolate Martini (above) to toast lovers and other strangers who find themslves at CityCenter, celebrating the sweet, varied enjoyment of Valentine's Day.

ARIA Resort And Casino has a Romance Package that includes a two-night stay in a tower suite, combining an in-suite couples' massage and aromatherapy bath, champagne and chocolate-covered strawberries and two day passes to The Spa at ARIA. The package is priced at $830 (Sunday – Thursday) or $1,030 (Friday – Saturday) and is valid through May 2011.

Tags: Aria Resort and Casino Las Vegas, Aria resort and Casino Valentines Day, CityCenter Las Vegas, Romance packages City Center Valentines Day, Tabu Lounge Las Vegas, The Spa at Aria Valentines day, Valentines Day City Center, Valentines Day Las Vegas, Vdara Hotel Valentines Day, Vdara Spa Valentines Day

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Stefano Pilati Designs The Opium Experience: A New YSL Retail Space At Crystals, Las Vegas

by Susan Kime (RSS feed) —

Filed under: By Design, Architecture & Design, Luxury Shopping

Stefano Pilati Designs The Opium Experience: A New YSL Retail Space At Crystals, Las Vegas

"I call it the opium experience," Stefano Pilati, Creative Director of Yves Saint Laurent, and of the Yves Saint Laurent's boutique retail space design. Opium is the name of the amber/reddish lacquer of the ceilings and wall panels. It is, serendipitously, also the name of the French brand's legendary perfume.

Las Vegas has two YSL Boutiques, but the one at City Center is the first to be designed in the Stefano Pilati style. Only two other YSL stores in the US feature this design at present. Historically, the store design was unveiled back in 2008 at the beginning of Paris Fashion Week. It was Pilati's hope that the design would become iconic enough to be recognizable without any logo.

"I wanted to do something that was timeless," Pilati said in an interview back then, " where the design had to go beyond my era at Saint Laurent: it had to be contemporary, with a strong, identfiable identity."

Tags: citycenter, CityCenter Las Vegas, stefano pilati, yves saint laurent

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A Substantial Debut: In Its First Year, CityCenter Receives Two AAA Five Diamond Awards

by Susan Kime (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Luxury Travel & Hotels, Real Estate Developments

Aria Hotel & Casino, CityCenter, Las Vegas

It seems hard to believe that CityCenter has been in operation only a year, but in that year it has received awards as noted below. The most recent and most unusual In its first year, is the AAA Five Diamond Award® for both ARIA Resort & Casino and Mandarin Oriental, The award is usually given to a few select properties deemed the finest in North America, but it is highly unusual for hotels to attain this rating within the first year of operation. The AAA Five Diamond Award winners make up just 0.27 percent of the rated venues throughout the United States, Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean.

Bobby Baldwin, CityCenter's President and CEO, said, "From inception to operation, our goal with CityCenter was to create a resort destination that provides guests with services and amenities unmatched in the world. To receive this honor in our first year, reflects our commitment to this promise. It is a great first anniversary gift."

This is not the Aria's first significant award. ARIA is the largest LEED® Gold certified building in the world. In addition to the AAA Five Diamond Award, in its debut year, ARIA has received multiple accolades including: Travel + Leisure's Top 20 Up-and-Coming Hotels in the World, 2010 Global Vision Award; Conde Nast Traveler's 2010 Hot List; Elite Traveler's World's Top Hotel Suites; Esquire's Best New Restaurants for 2010, Top 11 Restaurants Not To Miss; Food & Wine's Las Vegas' Best Bets, Go List 2010, 100 Best New Food & Drink Experiences; MSN's Top 10 New Dining Destinations; Entrepreneur's Best Business Bars; US Airways Magazine's Top 15 Coolest Hotels in U.S.

Tags: citycenter, CityCenter Las Vegas, las vegas hotels, las vegas strip, LEED

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Las Vegas Green Fairy Tales: The Absinthe Bar at Sage, CityCenter

by Susan Kime (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Spirits

Of all inevitable places to have an Absinthe Bar, it's Las Vegas. And there it was, at the Sage Restaurant in Aria, part of the CityCenter enclave of exceptional architecture, retail, dining, and now, Absinthe. With that said, Sage is not the only place in Las Vegas to drink Absinthe -- Liquidity at Luxor, and the bars at Wynn have it also, but Sage's Absinthe service has a wide variety of type, education and drinking experience.. You leave there really knowing about the evolution and mystery of this unusual liqueur.

Absinthe's history is tied to heightened creativity, murder, dementia, and criminality. For 95 years, it was illegal to bring it into the United States. Absinthe is a 140-proof green liqueur made from fennel, anise, and the exceptionally bitter leaves of Artemisia Absinthium. That last ingredient, also known as wormwood, gives the drink its name, as well as its complex, sinister, yet creative reputation. Wormwood has in it an ingredient -- Thujone-- considered for years to be hallucinogenic. For a century, Absinthe was demonized and outlawed, based on the belief that it leads to Absinthism - a disease that supposedly caused epilepsy, dementia, hallucinations, and murder.

Tags: Absinthe, Absinthe History, Aria Las Vegas, CityCenter Las Vegas, Grand Absente Absinthe, Kubler Absinthe, Le Tourment Vert Absinthe, louche, Lucid Absinthe, Mansinthe Absinthe, Obsello Absinthe, Pernod 68, Sage Restaurant, Sochi 2014, St. Geogre Vert Absinthe, Thujone, types of Absinthe, Wormwood

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The Opening of the Veer Residences, CityCenter Las Vegas

by Susan Kime (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Real Estate Developments

Last week, on July 14th, the Veer Towers, an integral part of CityCenter, Las Vegas, opened for business. It is one of the most, architecturally avant garde buildings within an exceptional array of edgy, urban structures, Veer Towers is designed by Helmut Jahn and is the only full residential development at City Center. The Towers incline toward each other at 5 degree angles from the center, and are 37 feet high, home to 335 contemporary condo residences, ranging from 500 to 3300 square feet, from studios to 3 bedroom residences and penthouses. Pricing begins from the mid $300,000s to a few million, depending on size, location and interiors. Turnkey interior packages are available, where potential members can move in with only their toothbrush, if desired. At present, in honor of the Veer opening, at some of the Veer towers studios owners can receive a complimentary turnkey interior design/living package, worth up to $20,000 -- an interesting deal, and might include a toothbrush.

I have written about City Center on Luxist before in an article entitled: City Center: The New Urban Vision, but had never been to Veer Towers, as they had not been completed. Now, walking into the residential towers from other areas of CityCenter, I was reminded how much of a city within a city CityCenter really is. Everything is within close proximity. From seeing a studio with exceptional views of the a portion of the Las Vegas skyline, plus multileveled rooftops of Crystals,the 500,000 square floor retail/shopping area, to a residence on a higher floor, ( see image above), the Veer residences offer a sense of sanctuary and peace, all within a city NOT known for such things. Looking out a Veers Towers window at this city of constant. colorful movement can be a peace-inducing experience.

Tags: citycenter, CityCenter las Vegas, Crystals Las Vegas, Las Vegas, las vegas hotels, las vegas real estate, las vegas real estate market, luxury condo hotel residences, Opening of Veer Towers, Veer Towers

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CityCenter: The New Urban Vision of Las Vegas

by Susan Kime (RSS feed) —

Filed under: By Design

On the back cover of a recent New Yorker Magazine, bastion of serious fiction, non-fiction and poetry, was a full page ad that took me by surprise, especially after I had just traveled there for the Luxury Summit conference. It said, " So you're not a Vegas person... " and then in huge block letters, "ARE YOU SURE?" It was an ad for CityCenter, and touted all the great art, great culture, restaurants and cultural atmosphere found there. But that ad stuck with me, as the inference was the theme I was going to explore: could a visionary development on a grand scale change personal tourist attitudes toward a destination? And conversely, could Las Vegas actually be perceived differently because of one grand multi-use venue?

In thinking about this, it is crucial to remember that Las Vegas is a desert city, situated in a barren Mojave desert valley. The city is about 2000 feet above sea level, it rains, on average, less that 5 inches a year. But visionaries have come here before, dreamed big dreams, and built. Historically, Las Vegas's persona is tied to big gaming and play in all its dark and light dimensions. But the building of CityCenter challenges this Las Vegas stereotype, as its vision hopes to resculpt and redesign Las Vegas's neon persona, by creating a design as well as an eco-sensitive aesthetic unseen and untried anywhere else. Here are some basic dimensions.

Tags: ARIA Las Vegas, citycenter, CityCenter Las Vegas, Crystals Las Vegas, Infinity World Development Corp., Jim Murren, Las Vegas, Leed Gold certification, LEED Gold certified, Mandarin Oriental, MGM Mirage, Vdara Hotel