Thousands of rose petals showered more than 8,000 visitors as they wandered throughout the grand opening of Las Vegas’s newest shopping experience Desert Passage, on August 14.
Amid glistening domes and towers reminiscent of the romantic cities of Tangier, Bombay, Fez, and Casablanca, guests were fully immersed in the sights, sounds, scents and scenes of the ancient spice routes as they roamed through the 500,000 square foot marketplace under hand-painted desert sky motif and to the sounds of Moroccan rhythms.
The Desert Passage surrounds the new Aladdin Resort &Togel Hongkong CasinoCasino, which opened August 17. It features over 130 retail stores as well as 16 restaurants and nightclubs. It also houses a 7,000-seat Theater of Performing Arts where top entertainers will perform. And it and is located just across the street from Bellagio and next door to Paris on the Las Vegas Strip.
“The turnout was staggering and the energy was sensational,” says Lee H. Wagman, president of TrizecHahn Development Corporation, creators of Desert Passage. “We couldn’t have hoped for a more spectacular event.”
n addition to exotic artists and performers such as henna body painters, Gnawa musicians, and dancers directly from their homelands of Morocco and India, festivities included an opportunity for guests to be the
first to shop and dine in some of the destination’s world-class stores and restaurants.
Retailers not only presented an uncommon collection of wares but also provided a rare glimpse of the captivating marketplaces and street scenes of this fascinating world in their meticulous and unusual store design.
Offering a grand presentation of what guests will enjoy every day of the year, Desert Passage’s unveiling was filled with exotic dance, music, artistry, and colorful spectacle of the world’s most provocative and picturesque market cities. Festivities included the christening of a 155′ trans-steamer ship anchored in the destination’s Merchants Harbor and actual rain-showers occurring intermittently off its bow.
Desert Passage is a development of TrizecHahn Development Corporation headquartered in Los Angeles and San Diego, the retail/entertainment development division of TrizecHahn Corporation.
Desert Inn Ends Chapter in Las Vegas
The 50-year-old Desert Inn, a historic Las Vegas resort once owned by billionaire recluse Howard Hughes who used one of its floors as his own private reserve, shut its doors forever on August 28, 2000 with its new owners planning to rip it down to make way for a mega-complex.
Casino Mogul Steve Wynn bought the Desert Inn for $270 million last June shortly after stepping down as chief executive officer of Mirage Resorts Inc., which was purchased by MGM Grand Inc. in May to form MGM Mirage.
Desert Inn is one of the oldest properties on the Las Vegas Strip. The resort was the fifth Las Vegas Strip property – and one of the largest – when Wilbur Clark completed it in 1950 at a cost of $3.5 million. The fabled resort had 300 hotel rooms, a casino, a spa and two restaurants.
The resort’s casino closed at 2:00 am on August 25, and the doors closed to the public for good 12 hours later, said spokeswoman Caroline Coyne. “It’s a time of nostalgia and melancholy because it’s hard to say goodbye under any.
TheDesert Inn was one of Southern Nevada’s largest resorts when it opened on April 24, 1950.
circumstances,” she said, speaking for the employees and some of the guests who came to pay their last respects.
Wynn plans to demolish the present complex within seven months and build a new 59-story resort on the site. He said the new complex would not be called the Desert Inn, but he has no disclosed a new name.
