The Snob's Guide to Las Vegas: A New Era for the Strip
Even in its heyday, when Frank Sinatra and Elvis Presley were headlining, Brigitte Bardot and Gunter Sachs were honeymooning, and Jayne Mansfield was partying at the Dunes, Las Vegas was not the height of refinement. It was a place to indulge and perhaps regret later, a neon cherry on top of a decadent sundae. Something has changed in the decades since, though. Against all odds, Sin City became…respectable. Well, almost. Where you least expect it, Vegas hides pockets of class.
In January the Bellagio unveiled its new supper club, the Mayfair, a jewel box designed by Swedish architect Martin Brudnizki to bring to the Strip some of the confectionery rush that has made his Annabel’s in London the place to chat under a Picasso or power-lunch in the winter garden.
“Las Vegas is fantasy—it is totally made up. That and this idea of the supper club, something that used to be popular but doesn’t really exist anymore, were exciting to me. It feels both new and nostalgic,” Brudnizki says.
That juxtaposition was also built into the programming, which includes dinner and performances led by hosts “Dean” and “Judy.” To realize his Old World Vegas fantasia, Brudnizki homed in on the Bellagio’s famed fountain show, imagining a kaleidoscope of fantastical underwater creatures. Mosaics depicting starfish and other nautical critters cover various surfaces, while scalloped banquettes and coral chandeliers are pulled straight from a dreamy oceanic palace.
“Our internal nickname for the project was ‘the fountain club,’” Brudnizki says. Like Annabel’s, Brudnizki’s Mayfair space delights in indulgence and maximalism. Except here the fabulous ghosts of the past are sitting right beside you when you order just one more martini.
This story appears in the April 2020 issue of Town & Country. SUBSCRIBE NOW
You Might Also Like
