Date set for closure of Mirage to make way for Hard Rock Hotel in Las Vegas

LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — The closure date for the Mirage is set as construction is planned to begin on the 700-foot guitar tower that will mark the new Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas.

In a news release, Hard Rock International announced it would shut down The Mirage Hotel & Casino on July 17 in preparation for transforming the resort into Hard Rock Hotel & Casino and Guitar Hotel Las Vegas. The property transformation will include a nearly 700-foot-tall guitar-shaped hotel tower.

It will be the second time this year that a Strip casino shutters. The Tropicana Las Vegas closed in April after 67 years to make room for a $1.5 billion baseball stadium planned as the future home of the relocating Oakland A’s.

Developed by former casino mogul Steve Wynn, the Mirage opened with a Polynesian theme as the Strip’s first megaresort in 1989, spurring a building boom on the famous boulevard through the 1990s.

The newly transitioned Hard Rock resort is expected to double the number of jobs available at the property, and the renovation is planned to spawn 2,500 construction jobs, the release said. It added that Hard Rock would pay around $80 million in severance packages for employees who remain during the renovation.

The development followed a Jan. 2022 announcement of the impending rebrand of the resort by Hard Rock International. Along with that news came a change.org petition to “Save The Volcano of The Mirage in Las Vegas” from demolition. To date, that two-year-old petition has nearly 11,000 signatures.

Its volcano fountain was one of the first sidewalk attractions, predating the Venetian’s canals and the Bellagio’s dancing fountains. It was known as a venue where tourists could see Siegfried and Roy taming white tigers or a Cirque du Soleil act set to a Beatles soundtrack.

In Dec. 2022, Hard Rock released renderings of the proposed guitar-shaped tower, which would reshape the Las Vegas Strip. The images resembled South Florida’s Seminole Hard Rock, which is also shaped like a guitar. The planned addition is expected to boast over 3,600 rooms and 174,000 square feet of casino space. On March 22, 2023, the guitar tower received its final approval.

In April, it was announced that the Beatles and Cirque du Soleil’s collaboration “The Beatles LOVE,” which had performed regularly at The Mirage since 2006, would bow for the last time on July 7.

Culinary Union Secretary-Treasurer Ted Pappageorge released a statement on behalf of the union on the closure announcement that read in part:

“Late last year, the Culinary Union negotiated for and won redevelopment and closure language to ensure workers have the option to choose either a service recognition bonus of $2,000 for every year of service, plus 6 months of pension and health benefits (or a lesser amount while maintaining seniority rights for the duration of the property’s closure), and 36-months of recall rights.

“Culinary Union contracts include strong language on layoff, recall, seniority, training, and placement so that unionized workers, who choose to retain their recall rights and are recalled within 36-months of layoff, will have access to free job training and seniority right of first-access to available job openings when the property reopens, and placement into other job opportunities as they are available.“

Room reservations and performance tickets that exist after July 14 will be canceled and refunded, officials said, adding that the Hard Rock Cafe on the Las Vegas Strip will remain open for business.