The final cards have been dealt as the iconic Mirage closes its doors on the Las Vegas Strip

LAS VEGAS (AP) — A final explosion from the iconic Mirage volcano marked the end Wednesday of an aging Las Vegas resort that wowed crowds when it opened in 1989 and later revolutionized the casino resort industry and reshaped Las Vegas as a tourist destination.

“What would the Mirage be without one last volcanic eruption?” asked Joe Lupo, president of the Mirage property, at the end of a closing ceremony that drew hundreds of spectators, including 137 employees who have worked at the 3,044-room resort since its inception.

Jim Allen, the property’s new owner, based in Florida Hard Rock International and Seminole Gamingsaid work would “literally begin tomorrow” to raze the volcano, which has rumbled and erupted every night for nearly 35 years.

Plans call for a 600-room building guitar shaped hotel The renderings show guitar-string-like beams jutting into the night sky from a 650-foot (201-meter) purple tower. Allen promised more details in the coming months.

Lupo, who remains chairman of the property after the change of hands, said the new Hard Rock Las Vegas will open in 2027.

Elaine Wynn, a billionaire philanthropist and ex-wife of casino mogul Steve Wynn, who built the property, recalls that two working tigers owned by resort stars Siegfried & Roy were the first “guests” through the door in November 1989. She said the first wave of people stopped, stared and cheered under the entrance atrium, which featured lush tropical foliage under a domed glass ceiling and a faint smell of piña colada in the air.

Last week, slot machine halls drew frenzied crowds ready to gamble for a combined $1.6 million in progressive jackpot winnings, which state regulations required had to be paid out to clear accounts before the doors closed. Slot players lucky enough to get a seat competed for daily prizes totaling up to $250,000 a day. Nevada Gaming Control Board spokesman Michael Lawton said Wednesday that he could not legally provide details on how the operation unfolded.

At a cost of $630 million, the Mirage was no mere gambling den. It was the largest hotel in the world when it opened. Visitors were greeted by two bronze mermaid statues on the way to check-in at a desk with a huge shark and an aquarium behind it.

There were glitzy boutiques, restaurants with celebrity chefs and theater-sized showrooms with headliners like Johnny Mathis, Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton. The illusionist duo Siegfried & Roy and their tigers performed there for 14 years, until 2003. Later, it became the venue for The Beatles Cirque du Soleil show “Love,” which ended its 18-year run this month.

“Instead of neon lights, a garden of dozens of Canary Island palms and a refreshing waterfall,” Steve Wynn said in a press release issued Monday by his Las Vegas attorney, Donald Campbell. Wynn titled the statement “A Tribute to Lady Mirage.” He did not attend Wednesday’s ceremonies.

In its statement, Wynn noted that the Mirage was the first new hotel in Las Vegas in several years and that it opened amid competition from casinos in Atlantic City, New Jersey, and the expansion of tribal gambling in California. It pointed to the decade-long resort construction boom that followed, helping make Las Vegas one of the fastest-growing cities in America.

“To say The Mirage is a catalyst would be an understatement,” Wynn writes.

By 2000, more than 30,000 new hotel rooms had been added as new resorts sprung up on the Las Vegas Strip: Excalibur, Luxor, Treasure Island, MGM Grand, New York-New York, Monte Carlo, Bellagio, Mandalay Bay, Venetian and Paris Las Vegas. Many were financed by Wall Street bonds. Wynn purchased and demolished the 50-year-old Desert Inn to build and open its eponymous Wynn Resort in 2005.

Wynn, now 82 and living in Florida, paid a $10 million fine to Nevada gambling regulators last year and severed ties with the industry he helped shape. end a legal battle that has lasted for years He was accused in 2018 of sexually harassing or assaulting several women at his hotels. He has always denied the allegations.

Bo Bernhard, director of the International Gaming Institute at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, who studies the emergence of what he calls the “entertainment economy” around the world, said the Mirage has set a standard for resort development in cities like Singapore and Sydney.

“The Mirage changed the image that Las Vegas projected to the rest of the world,” Bernhard said. It was “much more than just a gambling venue” and “it transformed everything,” he added.

The Seminole Tribe acquired the Hard Rock brand in 2007 from a MGM Resorts International transaction worth nearly $1.1 billion. It became the first Native American operator in the lucrative and competitive Las Vegas Boulevard corridor. The tribe also operates seven casinos in Florida and owns the Hard Rock Hotel & Casinos enterprise with locations in 76 countries. It purchased the naming rights in 2016 for Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens, Florida.

A former Hard Rock Hotel in Las Vegas, located off the Strip, was owned separately. A group including billionaire Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group, acquired the hotel-casino in 2018 for about $500 millionIt was renovated and reopened in 2021 as Virgin Hotels Las Vegas.

“Las Vegas is always reinventing itself,” said Michael Green, a UNLV history professor whose father played blackjack for decades at casinos including the now-defunct Stardust and Showboat. “The Mirage is no longer cutting edge.”