Living on the Strip

By Tony Illia

A new streamlined art deco condominium tower is rising near the Las Vegas Strip.

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Metropolis, a $50 million, 314,433-sq.-ft. high-rise, is located on the northwest corner of East Desert Inn Road and Debbie Reynolds Drive. The 20-story building contains 71 condominium units from 1,532-sq.-ft. to 5,350-sq.-ft. in size.

Homes range from one-story flats to dual-level lofts, each complete with custom millwork, marble floors, stainless steel appliances, and large terraces. Prices start at $565,000 and top out at $2.0 million.

The building is scheduled to open in June.

Vegas Ventures LP, the developer, is headed by Houston-based Randall Davis, who is best known for his renovation of the historic Rice Hotel in Houston, a 1913 building that hosted a number of well-known American luminaries including Tommy Dorsey and President John Kennedy.

"We think the Metropolis has a great sight with one of the best views of the Las Vegas Strip anywhere," said Gary Leach, a principal in Vegas Ventures LP. "It's important to have a great-looking building that residents are proud to live in. So the design is critical."

The sleek-looking Metropolis is meant to evoke the 1920s. Designed by Spencer Partnership Architects Inc. of Houston, with WRP Architecture of Las Vegas as architect-of-record, the tower has an EIFS and glass façade with ziggurats, rounded edges and stamped concrete detailing. A porte-cochere with planters and a colored concrete apron greets visitors at the building's main Desert Inn Road entrance.

"This building was patterned after the Argyle Hotel in Los Angeles, which served as a design inspiration, said Doug Watson, a WPH principal. "The southwest orientation was meant to maximize the resident views overlooking the Strip."

Like the Argyle Hotel, designed by Leland Bryant in 1929, most of the Metropolis' exterior surface consists of smooth concrete with windows forming a pattern of vertical bands that draws the eye upward to emphasize its height. Metropolis also embodies the art deco use of geometric forms in combinations of horizontal and vertical elements that reflect pure style.

The 212-ft.-tall Metropolis is built from cast-in-place concrete with post-tensioned concrete floors. It rests on a foundation of 80 drilled caissons, up to 70-ft. -deep and 6-ft. in diameter. Residential Constructors LLC a wholly owned subsidiary of McCarthy Building Cos., is the general contractor.

The building footprint, which measures 30,000- sq. -ft., consumes the narrow 1.3- acre site and leaves little room for staging. Residential Constructors had to carefully sequence material deliveries while employing a 265-ft.-tall tower-gentry crane to lift supplies into place. >> The hammerhead-style crane, supplied by Sierra Equipment Co. Inc. of San Francisco, was critical for flying forms and concrete into place.

"The building's unique make-up of radial curves and varying height residences on the same floor posed some construction challenges," said Ron Zurcher, Residential Constructor's senior project manager.

Because the building has dual and single-story units on each level, each floor plate was different. The building, engineered by SEA Consulting Engineers of Houston, uses a combination of sheer walls and columns for maximum structural flexibility. Residential Constructors hand finished 10 percent of the project's 10,240 cu. yds. worth of concrete work.

The first building's three floors serve as a garage with a combined 122 parking spaces. Amenities inside Metropolis include a fitness center and wine room on the fourth floor, with plans for a future ground-level outdoor swimming pool.

Floors five through 17 are all lofts and studios, while the remaining upper levels contain penthouses.

The project has an aggressive 16-month schedule with up to 300 workers onsite during the height of construction activity.