City of Dreams
Cotai Strip, Macau
OWNER: Melco Crown Entertainment
DESIGN ARCHITECT: Arquitectonica
INTERIOR DESIGNER: Peter Remedios, Gettys
GENERAL CONTRACTORS: Leighton Asia and John Holland, in conjunction with China State Construction Engineering
TOTAL INVESTMENT: $2.4 Billion
One of the last of the first wave of mega-resorts in Macau opened in mid 2009 when Melco Crown’s City of Dreams debuted on the Cotai Strip across from the equally massive Venetian, owned by Las Vegas Sands.
City of Dreams is the brainchild of the talented Lawrence Ho, who envisioned a resort that would appeal to the Asian clientele that flocks to Macau. While there have been massive changes since first visualized, City of Dreams took less than one month to draw 1 million visitors to witness its splendor.
Designed by the U.S.-based architects Arquitectonica, City of Dreams consists of three separate hotels—Crown Towers, Hard Rock and Hyatt—a 175,000-square-foot retail space, the Boulevard; and an iconic entertainment experience, the “Bubble,” which features a 360-degree video show designed by the innovative company Falcon’s Treehouse.
The name of the resort, lightly themed with a water experience to reflect the surrounding bays and tributaries, is an allegory, says Ho.
“There’s a deep meaning behind the name,” he says. “Rather than us trying to force our customers to live our dreams by building a heavily themed property, we’re going to try to fulfill their dreams.”
Starting from the massive 420,000-square-foot casino in the heart of the property and radiating out, the designers used feng shui principles to escort the players with luck from any point.
The casino arrival features a huge video screen that mimics an underwater scene with turtles, whales, sharks and a mermaid. The video is meant to welcome guests to the casino and point the way to the Boulevard, which surrounds the property and serves as a conduit to the various elements. Unlike other Macau resorts where the retail is set apart from the hotel, the guest is forced to travel by the shops and restaurants to get from one point to another.
The Bubble is a 10-minute interactive video presentation for which the audience stands inside the huge dome. “Dragon’s Treasure,” the first of the venue’s presentations (shows will change every six months, according to Ho) has viewers marveling at the water creatures and visual fantasies. The arrival of the dragon is dramatic and even a little scary.
Later this year, a theater will open with a show crafted by the Dragone Group, headed by Franco Dragone, one of the founders of Cirque du Soleil.
But it’s the massive nature of mega-resorts that Ho tried to minimize, as well.
“The original idea for City of Dreams came to me five years ago,” he explains. “At that time, I visited Las Vegas and other international resorts to visit the casinos and the hotels. One of the things I disliked was gigantic, 3,000-room hotels. If you have to wait 45 minutes for a cup of coffee or an hour and a half for a steak, that’s not good service. When you’re talking about the leisure business, it’s really about the total experience. Rather than make the design and construction of these resorts easier, we should really try to accommodate the customer the best that we can.”
