• Home
• Features
• News
• Hotels
• Shows
• Games
• Maps
• Tips
• MyVegas
• Board

The Los Angeles Times took the much ballyhoo'd new addition to the Venetian MEGACENTER™ - The Palazzo - for a spin and came back with a less than glowing... possibly dimly flickering... review of the joint.

...the design and the personality of the place don't advance the idea of luxury hotels, though its $199 to $499 rates make its rooms among the most expensive in the city, and those are just the introductory rates.

The Palazzo takes no lessons from the nimble, youthful boutique-hotel movement or from wittily themed Vegas hotels. Instead, the 50-story complex feels more like an inflated Four Seasons. To put it in fashion terms, it's a well-bred woman in a beige Armani pantsuit, while its Siamese-twin sister, the Venetian, is a siren in a Roberto Cavalli cocktail dress.

No real surprise here given the artistic proclivities of its visionary, paleolithic businessman Sheldon Adelson, who, when he does listen to music, jams to the oom pa pa of Johann Strauss' Viennese waltzes - the dreck of the classical music universe. No Charles Ives, Aaron Copland, Morton Feldman, John Cage, Johnny Cash or Johnny Ramone sonic vibrations are shaking the rafters at Sheldon's joints - home or hotels. (Are these references too obtuse?) Apparently, your grandmother's Las Vegas is alive and well at the Palazzo.

To be fair, hotels rarely present their best face until after several weeks of operation. That may be why the unused pipes filling my room's gigantic tub spewed brown sediment into my bath. At the elevator lobbies, gusts of sewer gas coming from who-knows-where caused guests to cover their noses.

The bedsheets were still scratchy-new and bits of Styrofoam packing materials stuck to the furniture. When my bag went from my hands to "luggage world" (their term), it took a pleading phone call and 75 minutes to get it back.

A place this large may need months, so I'll come back for another assessment -- with my track shoes.

Ouch!

The guests weren't the only ones who are dissatisfied with the way the Palazzo's flaccid opening has been handled. Celebrity Chef Wolfgang Puck, normally an amiable guy, had some rather salty words about the Palazzo's hurried opening.

Puck wasn't happy that the grand opening brought hundreds of VIPs and journalists to an incomplete resort.

"I think it's stupid," Puck said of the event's timing. He would have preferred a black-tie affair, where restaurateurs could have invited guests to their finished restaurants. Instead, in a stuffy Venetian ballroom, journalists and others juggled tiny plates and toothpicks to sample bits of the cuisine to come.

"You get a taste," Puck said, "but it's not the whole experience."

Which pretty much sums up the Palazzo - an incomplete experience. Follow the link to read the full article.

» Indiana Casinos: Card Counters Get Lost

» Sneak a Peak Inside Encore Macau

» Pinnacle Officially Abandons Atlantic City Casino Project

Recent Comments:

» More Comments

The Latest:

Vegas: Ritz-Carlton Chokes on Luxury Ham Sandwich, Closes
Macau: Sneak a Peak Inside Encore Macau
CityBOOM: Pinnacle Officially Abandons Atlantic City Casino Project
FeltJungle: Indiana Casinos: Card Counters Get Lost