That’s fundamentally what Las Vegas is about.”Ĭentral to the pirate village was a free show called “Battle of Buccaneer Bay.” Its climax was a raging battle between a pirate group and a British ship on the artificial lagoon that sat in front of the property. But also because of the whole idea of getting lost in a fantasy experience for some time. “All of us were partially captured because ‘Treasure Island’ was a significant work of literature in our lives. “That just instantly captured the imagination of the architects and the designers,” Feldman said. After working on a pirate-themed show, he sketched out a little pirate village and sent it to the Mirage team. Wynn and project designers for Mirage Resorts, including Joel Bergman and Jon Jerde, were inspired by an idea shared by set designer John Napier, Feldman said. Still, the idea for Treasure Island came out of the child-like fascination of a pirate adventure. Not for children.’ But it was one of those stories that was just too good to tell.” “That was really when we first started seeing all of this, ‘Vegas is for families.’ I’m doing interviews practically every day in the month leading up to and just after the opening saying, ‘No, no, no. “The story kind of got away from us a bit,” Feldman said. Its opening in 1993 was part of a boom in growth on the Strip as operators tried to cast a wider net of visitors that reached beyond gamblers.Īlan Feldman, a former gaming executive who was vice president of public relations for Mirage Resorts when Treasure Island opened, said while the resort was originally viewed as a family-friendly option on the Strip, it wasn’t only meant to be that. The resort celebrated its 30th anniversary on Thursday. The week-one spectacle set the tone for what Treasure Island would be for years to come. 27 a grand opening ceremony tied the new resort to future development on the Strip when cannons from the pirate ships went off at the same time as the demolition of the Dunes hotel, the spot that would later become the Bellagio. He welcomed gamblers to his property on Oct. Mirage Resorts developer Steve Wynn wanted to capture the imaginative spirit of Las Vegas through his newest resort, a pirate theme inspired by the novel by Robert Louis Stevenson.

(Bizuayehu Tesfaye/Las Vegas Review-Journal years ago, Treasure Island welcomed guests with a bang.

Guests leave Treasure Island, on Wednesday, Oct.

Treasure island hotel and casino photos