Virgin Hotels-led group acquires Las Vegas Hard Rock

A group headlined by Virgin Hotels has acquired the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas from a Brookfield-managed private real estate fund. 

Juniper Capital Partners, Fengate Real Asset Investments, Dream Hard Asset Alternatives Trust, Cowie Capital Partners and other private investors are all part of the deal. 

The group has planned to redevelop the Hard Rock hotel as the Virgin Hotels Las Vegas, scheduled to open in fall 2019. This will be the first Virgin Hotels-branded property in the city. 

The hotel, on Paradise Road, just off of the Vegas Strip, will continue operating under the Hard Rock brand until it reopens as a Virgin hotel. The hotel’s guestrooms, restaurants and public spaces will undergo an extensive refurbishment before reopening. It will have 1,504 guestrooms and a 60,000 square-foot casino once the renovations are complete. 

"Las Vegas has long held a special place in my heart," said Sir Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group. "Virgin Atlantic and Virgin America have enjoyed flying to Las Vegas for years and I've always known that Virgin Hotels could thrive there as well. I'm really looking forward to painting the town Virgin red." 

"Las Vegas is a dynamic city – the people, the excitement, the entertainment. To me, it's always been the perfect city for our next Virgin Hotel," said Virgin Hotels CEO Raul Leal. "We are dedicated to delivering the best in design, entertainment, heartfelt service and culinary excellence and we can't wait to welcome visitors to what is sure to be an awe-inspiring Las Vegas experience."

The new Virgin Hotel coming to Las Vegas will follow the brand’s new property scheduled to open in San Francisco in 2018. Virgin Hotels will manage the 196-room property while Paradigm Hotels Group will develop it. 

The Virgin Hotels pipeline includes projects in Nashville, Dallas, Washington, D.C., New Orleans, New York, Silicon Valley, Palm Springs, Calif., and Edinburgh, Scotland, which are all slated to open by 2020. The new properties in Nashville, Dallas and New York are currently under construction. The hotel group is also eyeing opportunities for hotel and office conversions and ground-up developments in other cities, including Boston, Los Angeles, Miami, Austin, Seattle, and London.