Viva Las Vegas!

7. Tropicana Las Vegas

Las Vegas, NV

Book Now

Ben Jaffe cut his entertainment teeth on the Fontainebleau Hotel in Florida in the 1950s when it was considered the most luxurious playground in Miami Beach. In 1955 he came to Las Vegas with the idea of recreating the South Beach ambiance in the Nevada desert. He aimed to build the finest hotel in Las Vegas and the leaded glass ceiling over the casino floor imparted a sense of the Italian Renaissance elegance to reach that goal. But construction overruns delayed the opening until 1957 and the Tropicana always struggled against larger hotels. Still, renovations came in 1979, 1986 and 2011 and the 1,467-room hotel remains one of the few remaining heritage casino hotels on The Strip.