Exploring the ABANDONED Riviera Casino! 

Thanks for the trip down memory lane! My wife and I stayed there for our honeymoon in 1995. We got to see it summer of 2016 before it was demolished. Great memories!

It really bothers me that Vegas is tearing down alll of its iconic casinos

Thanks for sharing. We stayed there in Dec 2012. It was already a ghost town then. Maybe 4 people playing in the whole casino, restaurants open but no customers. Sad.

So good to see all the comments, 25years ago my husband and I stayed there for 3 nights, it was a fantastic experience both the hotel and the casino. We did not know any of its history at the time, but how fantastic to read about the hotel 25yrs later, our 50th wedding anniversary. Thank you. Mary England.

Thank you for posting this. Brought a tear or two. I have been staying at the Riviera for more than 30 years. Sad to see it look like this. So many great times had there.

I was very surprised that the electricity was still on.

I was just out in Vegas last weekend and was staying at the Encore, I did not know about the Riviera being closed down and I was looking forward to seeing the lights at night, then my friends said it looked dead and we looked closer and then noticed no cars etc... I looked it up to see they closed. I hate that the history of this place will only really be in memories like all the others. It would be cool if they kept the front piece and built around it just to keep a bit of history... Oh well. Thanks for the tour!

This makes me so sad to see. :-( The Riviera holds a special place in our lives as well. Back in 2013, I took my husband there for his first trip to Vegas. April 2015 we made it a point to stay at the Riviera again before it closed. It was our home away from home. I have a small collection of Riviera items for nostalgia, including the phone from our last room, and the room number that was on our door. Thank you for posting this.

Las Vegas is a city unlike any other and I have been to them all, NY, LA, SF, Sydney, London, Paris, etc. but one that always struck me in awe was Las Vegas. Nothing beats the lights and action there. I stayed at the Riviera in 2010 and the room definitely was dated, and the casino looked dilapidated but I could definitely see the history behind the building. It is sad to see this place go. The building should have not been torn down. That's like saying let's tear down the Empire State Building because we want to put in something newer. Sheesh. So wasteful. That building could have been a better casino if they would just remodel it instead.

I love hearing all the memories and stories about the Riviera, I wish I could have visited it back in its heyday. Thanks for the video!

I feel so honored to have experienced the Riviera Casino with an old friend of mine, who was 92 when he asked me to accompany him. He and his late wife had always gone to Las Vegas in the 1950s and he said that he always loved the nightlife at the time. I fell in love with Las Vegas then, too in 2008. Great old casino and great entertainment! :)

I was there for a week in 1981. My dad was a Teamsters business agent and we were there for a convention. It was all carte blanche. We had 3 suites and as an almost 22 year old kid, going to the pool all day and charging food and drinks to our room really impressed me. The whole town was crawling with Teamsters and the millions spent on parties at places like Caesar’s Palace was really impressive. Such fond memories of that place. I was sad to see it go (and seeing it like this was eerie). Some of the shops were shown in this (that I purchased clothes from) and it took me right back. It’s sad…. And now the Trop is just another memory being reduced to rubble. My husband and I spent decades going there every summer for as long as two weeks at a time. It definitely went downhill in recent years but we will always cherish the memories we had going back to before places like The Mirage, Treasure Island, New York, New York, MGM Grand were even being planned. We watched that whole town change and in many ways not for the better. Always sad to see history vanish for so called progress.

My husband and I got married at Candlelight wedding chapel (It was across the street from Circus Circus) and stayed at the Hacienda, which is now Mandalay Bay. I miss the old Vegas. Even Fremont St isn't the same. Too kid-friendly. The ghosts of the Rat Pack and Bugy Siegel have left the city.

I have a perverse nostalgia for the era that the Riv represented; it was also the first location of #defcon that I attended that helped foster my security career, I played pinball in the strange dusty arcade area. Seriously it was much like stepping back in time. Thank you for this obvious labor of love, and for the fascinating tour of urban decay that so few appreciate! This was very cool.

I stayed there in 2010 on my first trip to Vegas. This place was great and I will never forget it. Everyone working their was very nice and professional. It had a style like no other!

This is.... surreal. I stayed at this hotel back in 2013 during the Christmas! I recognize some floors! Just recently, I learned that this hotel is now vanished! Wow...... thanks for filming this because this will be great historical documentary footage for people that enjoy history of Vegas!

Thanks memory Riviera! 1955-2016 wonderful 60 years

I was in Las Vegas the week before the Riviera closed its doors. I had to go in just to say I had been in the Riviera. It was such an icon, and I wish I could have seen Liberace. He, unfortunately, died when I was only about 10 years old.

I loved the Riviera! My bff and I went there to see Steve Martin when he was popular, spent a long weekend there and had some wild & crazy nights (separately!). Good memories 🤫

Back in the day, the Riv had been my father's regular stay in Vegas ever since it first opened its doors in 1955 - even before I was born...We had plenty of memorabilia in the house from the place...Lighters, playing cards, game chips, ashtrays, beer magnums, shot glasses, dishes, even snapshots or promo posters of celebs that performed there over the years... End of an era...

I've stayed at the Riviera many times over the years and it will always be my favorite in Las Vegas. The pool was one of the last on the strip to have an over 5 foot deep end where you could actually swim The Riviera pool was 9 Feet! The only other deep pool I know of on the strip still open is Bally (12 foot deep) The Riviera will be missed.

I've been to Las Vegas dozens of times over the years but haven't returned since 2009. It may have something to do with the loss of my favorite hotels over the years... Showboat, Hacienda, Stardust, Binions, and most recently Riviera. I had to pause at 5:00 as you walked across the mighty stage where I saw the great Don Menza and his big band when they used to have Jazz on the Strip every Monday night. If you weren't there an hour early, you were listening out in the casino! Thanks for this tour. The Riv was a grand old lady and is already missed...

This was neat to see. I stayed there in the middle of April for the first and last time. I was there with my college class for the NAB Show. We made lots of fond memories.

Boy, I would have loved to had a chance to explore a place like that!! Thanks for sharing.

The champagne brunch! 6.95 all you could eat flowing Champagne tower😭

Talk about a flashback! I last saw the Riviera when my Husband and I stayed there for a long weekend in 1975. The whole of Vegas has changed dramatically since then.

Sure brings back memories. I attended a trade show every other year at the Riviera starting in 1985 until 2011. I walked through the casino it seems like a thousand times. I will miss that grand Vegas icon.

I do miss the Riviera, I stayed there one of my first trips to Vegas as an adult back around 07 and it was great. the place was really showing it's age but i still loved it. I miss this place and the Sahara a lot. i have so many memories of staying at those places back in college with my friends, cramming as many people as we could in a double queen room to make it as cheap as possible then spending everything else on drinks and gambling. I remember som of our early trips we would only take around 200$ for a 2 or 3 night stay in Vegas. also you all have come a long way in quality in your videos over the years keep up the great work.

I never got to see it but my Grandparents loved the Riviera, makes me sad that it's gone now

Thanks for making this video, So long Riviera, you will never be forgotten.. If only they can just take off the Riviera names and leave everything standing and use those as part of the convention center instead of blowing it down.. I wish I can go back in time to see back the Stardust, Frontier, Desert Inn and Riviera.. Vegas was really bright and smooth back then, now Vegas is getting dark and rough without the Desert Inn, Stardust, Frontier, and Riviera. I'm sure Circus Circus and SLS are next, but I don't think they'll take off until maybe 3 - 10 years.

I used to work there many years ago 😢😢😢😢😢so sad

Omigosh!!! It's so sad to see the Riv like that!! Actually, I just now saw more of the inside than I did for the entire 19 years that I worked there!!! lol The Riv used to be such a classy place back in it's day. And now it is completely gone. Just like my other alma mater the Stardust. It was heart breaking for me, standing there across the street at the Riv on a break, and watching the countdown to implosion. So sad...so many good memories of 'old Vegas.' Thanks for posting your video. It's so strange to see only you and your son walking around. Not another person in sight!! Glad you got some nice mementos. And did you get the black and white Zebra stripe chairs from the show room... or some different ones?? Either way, glad you got some cool stuff!! I would have LOVED to have those, but I'm not there anymore. (Boo Hoo) Thanks again for the tour. You did a great job. :)

Great to see the inner workings of a casino resort. Looks like at this stage the liquidators and business people sill had tons of work to do. There is actually a lot of things that have to be done when closing down a business, especially when owned by another business such as the LVCVA. All of the furniture has to be removed, all the carpeting, ceiling tiles, light fixtures need to be removed. The elevators have to come out. Try to sell everything even if for scrap because it cost money to bring it to the dump. Looks like they already sold all of the gaming equipment and the room TVs. A huge 2 year job.

Was expecting to see the vault after clicking on this immediately LOL 🤘

Rad old retro Casino! The Martin Scorsese movie Casino was filled there on the casino floor one of the Best movies ever! I wish we could have matched up screenshots from the movie.

This is crazy and sad. I remember first time I went to vegas in early 90's and this was a hot spot.

You all know that this casino is where martin Scorsese casino was filmed??

I must have stayed there in or around 1986-1988. It was still one of the nicest hotels in Vegas. Then, The Mirage came, and everything changed.

From about 1995 to 2005 went there annually for pool tournaments. Last visited in August 2014 and it was clearly on the downslope then. Lots of memories there from playing pool with friends from Atlanta and Albuquerque. RIP Riv.

Thanks for uploading this interesting video.

I still gave you a thumbs up though cuz I love abandoned places

Riviera was my favorite. Had my room comped there a few times. I never was into the big mega casinos,,, always liked the old originals.

09:44 i think i saw a comedy show in that room back in the 1980s. 😊 loved that hotel.

THANKS, FOR THE MEMORIES...

This is so cool.. would have been a dream come true for me..can't believe all the stuff that was left behind..

First time I went to The Riviera was 1975 & the show we saw was Marie Osmond & an impersonator I can't recall. It was a dinner show & later the same nite we saw Frank Sinatra in concert at Caesars. Been there over 100 times but never stayed at Riviera. I was there during the liquidation sale May of 2015

It is so interesting & sad at the same time to see this abandoned space while so many are homeless in LV.

wow i didn't even know the riviera had closed. sad times. i have stayed there before. i used to stay there and at the Sahara with friends when we would go to Vegas in the late 2000s

This vid reminded me of the Sahara when I wandered the halls there during the auction after it closed in 2011.

this is so cool i live in england and never been to a casino in my life but would love to just be in there were its so unbelievably beautiful only 5 mins in n im in awe x

Good video. Very interesting. Miss the Riviera.

I visited the Riv every visit I went and finnally stayed there in October of 14.It was a great stay!Miss old Vegas😞

Wow! I stayed At the Riviera once! Cool vid! But too shaky I see you have already got that message and I thank you for understanding!

when I lived there I had the chance to visit all the casinos and work in most as the company i worked for replaced most of the carpet in them. the riviera was a nice place to gamble and party as it was close to good parking and had some of the best shows an older casino could show. I miss those days of going down the strip and seeing history in action

Thanks for sharing.. another landmark gone I remember they had like 3 towers the Monaco Monte Carlo and forgot the third one. And the swimming pool was right in the middle the same pool where they filmed one of the best films Casino with Bobby De Niro and Allan King

😥 so sad to see it go. It was my favorite casino in Vegas 😥😥😥😥

Omg I stayed there last 2009 new year’s eve for 7 days, it was loud and crazy in the hotel and hall ways. Walked by that pool memories

I was there just once in 2008 and just loved the pool. I was just hoping you were going to walk out into that center courtyard.

Sometime in the late 90's or early 2000's there was a Vegas Hotel & Casino which was demolished on TV. What made this one different is that it ended up being aired on CNN because it was thought that someone was actually seen INSIDE the hotel just SECONDS before the explosion went off!... From the camera view that was pointed at the Hotel/Casino, a door was seen literally OPENING into one of the rooms from a high up floor, and a shadow that looked like a person could be seen running away from the door down the hallway. This was all caught on camera and filmed through the window of the Hotel. It was aired on CNN for DAYS afterwards, and they probably played the footage 100 times before it abruptly stopped being played. Fast forward to today, and it seems to be utterly IMPOSSIBLE to find any news reference of this occurrence. Granted, it was during a time when not everyone had a camera phone, so it seems plausible that it's difficult to find the video footage, but one would think at least the article would be available online, if only with still images. I have been searching for this news article and/or a video for years, but it seems as though it as literally been scrubbed from the internet. Many people I have talked to also remember this, and they do remember it the same way that I remember it, so it's not a misperception on my part. Does anyone else remember this? Does anyone have a link to the story? Did this really happen, or was it a mass imagination by dozens of people? Or even scarier yet, is this another example of the Mandela Effect? Any information, PLEASE!!!!

Great video! Pretty creepy...the Riviera was one of the old Mafia hotel-casinos!!

This was the first casino I ever stayed at as an adult in Las Vegas. It was so grandiose and larger than life!

So interesting your were in there lights on and everything. Was this during the sale taking place. Great opportunity to check it out. Good one.

The site will still smell like a cigarette 100 years after its torn down.

Nice vid I, never went to the Riviera. My family and I went to Vegas on mid June 2016, and the Riviera was already half demolished. I wonder what the hotel rooms looked like just a couple of months or weeks before the implotion.

I remember I used to go to alcoholics anonymous meetings at the Riviera I remember I even stayed at there once. But one of the surprising facts about Vegas is how every like 10 to 20 years it becomes a completely different place. What I mean is I remember after spending some time as an adult in Vegas looking forward to watching leaving Las Vegas again thinking I would know a lot of the sites and filming locations used in the movie but it was a completely different Vegas than what I had experienced many years later in almost all of the casinos in locations used in that movie had changed.

I like the look of that 2nd floor rooftop pool. Too bad they couldn't successfully prevent it from leaking onto the casino floor! I also visited the Riviera just for fun(the 1st floor and casino part), months before it closed in May 2015. Sad to think it got demolished. I often wonder if Circus Circus will one day, face that same fate? Or also what'll happen to the half built Fontainebleu(sp?), that was next door to Riviera?

The false facade at 2:07 reminds me of the false facades of the old west, where stores would put up a 2 story false facade in front of a one story log cabin.

Just watched the Ghost Adventures episode they did on this place before they imploded it and it definitely was haunted!

was my favorite place to stay every time I visit Vegas......miss it

I lived in Vegas bit trying to remember where the rivera..was. I worked at the flaming and other Down town casinos sad it's abandon. one of the old ones

Was watching the clip for the casino but loved his shirt Go Flyers! #WeAreUD

I don't gamble and have no interest in gambling but I find casinos to be fascinating places after having seen documentary programs about them and having seen the movie "Casino" on TV. Casinos are so complex and organized and efficient even in small details. This may sound odd but I've seen some similarities between casinos and religious places such as convents and monasteries which also have a very structured, multi-department, detailed, precise way of operating.---I saw so much usable material just in this short video. I hope a lot of it was re-located.---I also saw comments about having the casino become a homeless shelter and school. I appreciate the caring of people who say that but I think it's financially unrealistic and that the town would have found itself with a ghetto on the strip and probably with a crime problem. Many homeless people have other problems besides not having a place of their own to live in and some are involved in criminal activity. A former Las Vegas casino is not the place for many people who are homeless.

Nice video and fun to watch. Take care now.

First hotel my wife and I stayed at in Vegas. Now it’s an empty lot

Got my first legal beer there at 21 back in 2006 and first gamble as well good memories

I never went to the Riviera before, even though I've lived in Vegas my whole life. I found out that after it was demolished that Casino and the original Ocean's Eleven, both movies Iove, was filmed there. Wish I could've at least went to it before it was torn down. It looks like it was a nice casino.

I came off of about 5 days on the road and was pretty grubbed out. They wouldn't rent me a room. Went into the head and washed up and changed my shirt. Came back and they rented me a room. Great times. The room was around $27. This was in '83 or so.

Such a shame to see these classic hotels no longer there.

Memories!! 😥😭😪

miss the days when the National Professional Paintball League would host it's events in the R's parking lot.... was always one of my favorite venues. on par with Huntington Beach

I used to stay at the Sahara, on the 24th floor in the Alexandria Tower and looked at the Riviera. Didn't know it had closed.

As I recall, from staying there a couple of times, the place was nearly as much of a dump when it was open as it was when you and Colin explored it.

Been to Las Vegas once... stayed at a timeshare behind the Imperial Palace which is now a parking lot - went to the Sahara, the LV Hilton, and the Riviera... all gone now...

omg so sad !!I remember this place the last place where I went to see a fashion show yup a fashion show full of latin American celebrities ...I would love to know what was going thru your mind at the time you filmed this Any nostalgia?

The pool.....what an utter disaster. I was lucky enough to see it in person.

It looks eerie and I can practically smell it. I imagine it smelt stale and sweaty, kind of like how a thrift shop would smell.

I stayed there a few times the original hotel room were very dated, the towers in the back were much better. Sad to see it go, but with the changing tastes and competition it couldn't last.

Great views of air conditioning units and roofs!

I had a honeymoon there as well back in 91 sad that its gone

0:01 "Plenty of fine books have been written in prison..."

Did you guys find any riviera casino chips? That would be cool to have one as a collectors item

I always Liked the Riviera Hotel Casino from Las Vegas and also I remember that in the Riviera they filmed the movie Casino with Robert Deniro

Great video!!!! You were so lucky to be able to explore such a huge derelict building. A true Urbexers dream!!!!

How were the escalators still running? Or, more correctly... why?

I just can't believe they left all that furniture and equipment behind!! Now that is REALLY sad!!

The working Elevators were the best part

Pls answer me guys. Why in every abandoned place in the US the electricity still running? And all the lights turned on?

Buy a gimble mount for your phone. Very much worth it, when filming and walking. Slow down a little and absorb the moment, the quiet, the memories. Show us the ticket stubs, explain the areas you think your in. Good place to film, glad you did it, but a gimble mount will make all the difference.

Quite creepy but interesting...Interesting that this place closed as late/recently as it did (May, 2015)

we're you allowed to walk around freely or did you have to get permission,read a recent comment that it was a liquidation sale what if you wanted something IE...a chair or any if the fittings did you have to take it down yourself or did the company take it down for you ....great video btw...thumbs up