Not yet, but one's coming.
In April 2001, at his 75th birthday party in Vegas, Playboy founder Hugh Hefner told the press that he wanted to finalize a deal for a Las Vegas Playboy Club by the end of that year.
Still, it took till November 2004 for Hefner to ink a licensing deal with Palms owner George Maloof to open the first Playboy Club since the last one closed in 1986. The first one opened 1960 in Chicago, and during the ’60s, it was the busiest nightclub in the world. At the peak, there were 35 Playboy Clubs, with 25,000 women, inlcuding the likes of Lauren Hutton, Julie Cobb, Deborah Harry, and Dorothy Stratten parading around as Bunnies. A new Bunny costume has been designed for the Palms' club.
When finished in May of this year, the club will occupy the 11,000 square feet on the top floors of the Palms’ new 40-story tower, scheduled to open in early 2006; the tower’s facade will feature a giant neon rabbit head, recognized far and wide as the Playboy logo. The cocktail waitresses will wear some version of the bunny costume and a logo shop will sell Playboy paraphernalia.
The tower will also house the Hugh Hefner Sky Villa, a two-story 12,000-square-foot Playboy Mansion-style penthouse suite to serve as a home-away-from-home for the 79-year-old Hugh Hefner. The suite will be accessible via a private glass elevator and will have indoor and outdoor pools.
What better place than Las Vegas to reintroduce the Playboy Clubs after a nearly 20-year absence?
