Oasis Casino, Las Vegas, Triblend Tee

Venue History

The Oasis Casino was a striking late-era addition to the legendary Dunes Hotel & Casino on the Las Vegas Strip, designed to refresh and expand the aging resort in the early 1980s. Built at the busy corner of Las Vegas Boulevard and Flamingo Road, the Oasis opened in August 1982 as a second casino building on the Dunes property. Architecturally, the Oasis Casino was pure early-’80s Vegas: a sleek, black mirrored-glass structure that contrasted sharply with the older Arabian-themed Dunes buildings. The project added roughly 18,000 square feet of new gaming space, boosting the resort’s capacity and giving it a fresh, modern frontage at one of the Strip’s most visible intersections. Although the building was two stories tall, only the ground floor opened to the public; the upper level remained unfinished and sealed off for the life of the property. Its most memorable feature stood outside: a cluster of dramatic neon palm trees flanking the entrance. Soaring about 70 feet high, with fronds stretching roughly 20 feet, the palms were designed by Jack DuBois of YESCO, based on earlier concept work by designer Raul Rodriguez. At night, they glowed in layered greens and yellows, creating a futuristic tropical effect that made the Oasis one of the Strip’s most eye-catching corners in the 1980s. Inside, the Oasis functioned as an extension of the Dunes’ main casino, offering rows of slot machines, table games, and a brighter, more contemporary environment than the original casino floor. It was part of a broader push to re-energize the Dunes in a fiercely competitive era, as neighboring properties modernized or rebuilt entirely. When the Dunes closed in 1993 ahead of demolition to make way for Bellagio, the Oasis Casino closed with it. During liquidation, the neon palms were removed by YESCO and sold; by the late 1990s they had resurfaced at the entrance to the NASA nightclub in Bangkok, Thailand, before vanishing again from public view. Today, the site where the Oasis Casino once stood is part of Bellagio’s iconic lake and resort complex. The Oasis lives on in photos, postcards, and memories as a vivid snapshot of early-’80s Strip style—mirrored glass, neon palms, and one last bold expansion before the Dunes itself disappeared.