“We’ve looked at a variety of locations around Las Vegas over the last six or seven years since we launched Virgin Hotels as a brand, and we always wanted to make sure that we had a destination location, and someplace that we could really carve out and make special the Virgin way,” explained Virgin Hotels CEO Raul Leal, speaking to the media. The 1,500 room and suite hotel will continue to operate as the Hard Rock until rebranding into Virgin Hotels Las Vegas is complete in late autumn 2019.
Virgin Hotels purchased the property with a group of partners including Bosworth Hospitality Partners founder, Richard Bosworth, the hotel’s new CEO Los Angeles-based investment firm Juniper Capital Partners and Toronto real estate firm Fengate Capital Management. In late March, Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group, announced that his company had purchased the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, with plans to transform the off-Strip venue into a Virgin Hotel. The billionaire founder of the Virgin Group, Richard Branson, has bought the Hard Rock Casino and Hotel in Las Vegas, while the property’s current casino management company, Warner Hospitality, will lease the casino portion of the business.
