Two Way Hard Three | Las Vegas Casino & Design Blog

Hunter and I were at Beau Rivage a month or so apart.
Here's my report from 2006. I was thinking about Beau today when I saw TV coverage of the Gulf oil spill. I remember seeing the shrimp boats from my room. What a disaster in the Gulf.
http://www.ratevegas.com/blog/2006/10/beau_rivage_bil.html

Detroit-

Yep, I was also wondering how Biloxi is doing after The Deepwater Horizon Spill. So far Mississippi has lucked out in the currents carrying all that oil elsewhere. And if the "Top Kill" procedure works to stop the leakage, Biloxi should ultimately be spared... But BP just started "Top Kill", a number of marine biologists aren't so sure yet whether it will actually work, and Biloxi isn't totally out of the woods yet.

And on a more upbeat note, I looked through the pics and Beau Rivage does look like a "Mini-Bellagio" on The Gulf Coast. It doesn't quite look as luxurious, but still top-notch for Biloxi. I usually don't make it that deep into The South, but if I ever find myself in Mississippi I'll give them a visit. (I AM an MGM Mirage Players' Club member, after all!) :-)

Remember staying at the Beau in mid-1999 when the Steve still owned the place. Such a beautiful place.....the IP there had just opened as well and was a nice place to gamble but didn't come close to the opulence of BR. Compared to the other casinos there, the place was probably overkill for the market.

I still don't understand why Wynn built it in Mississippi! Why Mississippi??

Kenny, if I recall correctly, Beau Rivage was the working name of the resort Wynn planned for the site of the Dunes......which later became Bellagio. The Beau moniker then was going to be applied to Wynn's plans for New Jersey, which ran into roadblocks by Donald Trump and others. I think Missisippi just turned out to be a more welcoming environment, but I think a Beau Rivage in the Marina area of AC would've made a killing.

Kenny-

hail is on the right track, but let me elaborate some more. Beau Rivage was originally intended for Las Vegas, but Steve Wynn had an epiphany while vacationing at Lake Como and decided to redo the former Dunes site as Bellagio. Mirage Resorts then tried to reenter New Jersey, but Donald Trump didn't even have to try too hard to keep Wynn out as The Golden Nugget drug and money laundering scandals of the 1980s were still fresh on regulators' minds. So with Mississippi moving to expand legal casino gaming in the 1990s, Wynn thought he could fill a void in the lack of high-end luxury casino resorts in The South by building Beau Rivage in Biloxi.

Beau Rivage was a flop at first, as everything from the Elizabeth Taylor narrated commercial to the inadequate valet parking to the restaurant selections turned off potential customers. After MGM Mirage took over and retailored Beau Rivage specifically for its Southern audience, they found its footing and it found success.

After seeing the empty beaches in Biloxi on TV news, even though there is no oil there, I got an offer from Beau Rivage. It had to have been planned before the oil disaster. After 3.6 years, they're offering three comped nights any time in June. Think I'll drive over in a week.

"Winner Takes All" by Christina Binkley's that was published a couple of years ago has an entertaining chapter about the opening of BR. Wynn was uncharacteristically inept for this opening, they just didn't get anything about the Gulf Coast region. Everything from the new carpets -- the more they steam cleaned them the moldier they became because the carpet material just wouldn't dry out in the humid climate, the restaurant items that Southerners were afraid to order - items like foie gras were not all appetizing.
But the highlight of the book is when Wynn himself stayed there and hotel kept getting his breakfast order wrong. Anyone who knows how particular Wynn is about making sure the eggs are incredibly fresh when they arrive at his guests room in the morning will be amazed reading about the Beau Rivage.

Posted by mike_ch

A lot of the problems in those book are like alternate universe versions of what CityCenter is experiencing.

"Southerners turning down foie gras" pretty much describes the scene outside Cafe Vettro to a tee. Every time I go by there I always stay long enough to see at least one crowd walk up and check out the menu. 90% of the time they walk away frustrated.