Ooooh, one of the first places I always visit in Vegas is Bellagio for the their amazing floral displays in the main lobby. Always a stunning treat.

Bellagio is right next door! And it's super nice to walk around in it!

I'm going to to that tomorrow! I've been in usability design conferences 8+ hours a day for almost a week and getting up way earlier than I'm used to - I'm amazed I've been with it enough to walk around this hotel.

They have a really cool bar at the Bellagio that's on the first floor (towards the back). And a chocolate fountain. And the Chihuilly (sic?) glass in the lobby.

It's unlike the other hotels I saw in Vegas in that it's really like wandering around an exceptionally large Italian villa where you happen to be a guest.

Coffee with my father. There are so many things about the war years that I never thought to ask him. After him, coffee with my father-in-law, to hear the war stories he never told his children but that he was apparently willing to tell me but I didn't think to pay as much attention as I should.

Ooh, I didn't know there was Chihuly at the Bellagio! I'll have to see that. I really like his stuff.

Ooh, I didn't know there was Chihuly at the Bellagio!

I'm pretty sure it's one of the biggest Chihuly pieces in the world.

The Bellagio is stunning. I remember being particularly struck by those glass flowers on the ceiling.

The Chihuly exhibit at, shoot, was it the de Young? Somewhere in SF. Wherever it was, just the sheer mass of glass on display was amazing. It looks like the Bellagio may deliver a similar effect.

Quoting:

Dale Chihuly's ceiling sculpture at the Bellagio, "Fiori di Como," literally means "flowers of Como." Como is a lake in Italy, and the beautiful flowers there inspired Chihuly's piece.

At 70 feet by 30 feet by 12 feet, "Fiori di Como" is the largest glass sculpture ever made. Walking into the lobby of the Bellagio and seeing the Chihuly sculpture suspended from the ceiling is truly an awe-inspiring experience. Because "Fiori di Como" is so large, pictures don't really prepare you for its size or impact.

All together, there are 2,000 individual blown-glass flowers that make up the sculpture. The weight of "Fiori di Como" is also staggering. The glass flowers weigh 40,000 pounds, and the steel structure holding it all in place weighs another 10,000 pounds.

Of course, the casinos of Vegas are wretched excess, but sometimes it's such lovely wretched excess. It's like Renaissance patronage of the arts, rich entities showing off their wealth and occasionally doing it with class.