If you drive by the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino right now, you’ll notice that change is coming. The Hollywood casino and entertainment complex looks a lot like downtown Fort Lauderdale, in that there’s plenty for fans of cranes and construction equipment to look at. When it’s done, there’s going to be a new landmark visible for miles around – a Hard Rock hotel shaped like a guitar jutting into the sky.
But that’s not the only goal all that dirt-moving is working towards. Plans call for a mid-2019 unveiling – plenty of time to get things running smoothly before February 2020, when, just down the road, Hard Rock Stadium hosts the Super Bowl.
The casino and hotel expansion will cost $1.5 billion – yes, that’s billion with a “b.” What does a cool $1.5 billion get you these days?
A Hard Rock Casino that’s almost doubled in size. It will include a nearly 20,000-square-foot poker room, 60,000 additional square feet for shops and dining, and room for more than 3,200 slot machines.
A rebuilt Hard Rock Live that, configured as a theater, can seat more than 6,500 for events such as concerts or comedy. The new venue will also offer a broadcast center and television studio with an aim towards airing events such as awards shows. While the new facility, which is also scheduled to open next year, is being built, the Hard Rock’s usual calendar of comedy, concerts and other events will take place in a new venue that will be transformed into a 37,000-square-foot ballroom when the new Hard Rock Live opens.
A 10-acre “Bora Bora Experience” pool complex surrounded by waterfalls and other water features. “Bora Bora” will include luxury villas with private pools and butler service. There will also be dining options, canoes and paddleboards in the complex.
That hotel with the “guitar” jutting 450 feet into the sky. When complete, the hotel will have 806 additional rooms and suites, including 638 in the guitar tower. A seven-story tower near the pool complex will house another 168 rooms.
“Our ancestors and elders welcomed curious tourists to our Florida reservations,” Seminole Tribe Chairman Marcellus Osceola Jr. says. “And today’s members of the Seminole Tribe of Florida will soon welcome visitors from all over the world to what will become a landmark destination…our guitar tower will attract global attention.”
