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Maybe one of our favorite Las Vegas icons, Hugh Hefner has been partying in Las Vegas for much of his adult life, and at 81 Hefner isn’t showing any signs of slowing down. With the new Playboy Club at the Palms Las Vegas, the Hefner empire has a bigger presence in Vegas than ever before. He also recently opened the $40,000 dollar a night Hefner Sky Villa at the Palms. The two-story party suite is filled with Playboy fun and it’s even modeled after an old Playboy article which highlighted all the makings of an ultimate bachelor pad.
Hugh Hefner was raised in Chicago. He served in the U.S. Army in World War II and later went on to take graduate courses at Northwestern University where he met his first wife, Mildred Williams. The couple had two children together. However, it was reported that they had a rough marriage and that after Mildred admitted to having an affair, Hefner was permitted by Mildred to see as many women as he liked. Hef did just that and ten years later the couple was divorced. Hef spent time working for Esquire magazine; he left the job because they would not give him a $5 raise. He raised $8,000 in investment money to launch the first issues of the (then considered) extremely controversial Playboy Magazine. The magazine was a success and it is reported that Hugh Hefner today is worth over $300 million.
In 1989 Hef fell in love again and decided to take another shot at marriage when he walked down the aisle with Kimberley Conrad, they had two children together but the marriage did not last. They separated in 1999. However, the couple never divorced and they are still legally married to this day. Hef and Conrad maintain a good relationship and she still lives right across the street in a house Hef bought for her so he could keep his children close by. Hef was already known as a womanizer and a heavy partier. But after his separation, he took it to the extreme by taking on seven (all blonde) girlfriends at one time. A few years later it was rumored that the constant partying and antics that went on at the famous Playboy mansion were getting too hard on the girls and causing fights among the group. Hef decided to downsize and many of the girls left willingly, leaving only two that Hef considered “gems”, Holly Madison and Bridget Marquardt. In 2004 a very young (18 at the time) Kendra Wilkinson was modeling as one of the “painted ladies” at a party at the mansion. She was dressed only in body paint. Hefner noticed her and invited her to come back to the mansion on her own time. She was soon invited to live at the mansion as one of Hefner’s girlfriends and she accepted.
Now the happy foursome has their own reality TV series The Girls Next Door which takes place inside the Playboy mansion and highlights their anything-but-ordinary daily lives. The show has had huge success and the Playboy empire is as strong as ever, constantly opening new retail shops. One is located inside the Forum Shops at Caesars Palace. Playboy also owns Spice Network as well as several other TV, DVD, and online adult entertainment ventures. The magazine’s circulation is over 4 million copies worldwide and there have recently been rumors circulating about Hefner and “number one” girlfriend Holly Madison’s possible engagement and baby plans.
Although Hefner has said publicly that Holly is his number one girlfriend (they share a bed and living area), the foursome has stayed together. They often make appearances in Las Vegas, especially at the Palms which welcomes Hef with a Playboy bunny symbol permanently fixed to one side of the Palms Fantasy Tower. Hef’s fantasy suite serves as the anchor of the Palms Fantasy Suites and brings in unprecedented revenue for the hotel. But the most recent addition, the Playboy Club located on one of the top floors of the hotel, is really something every Las Vegas visitor should see. It is impossible to forget the iconic image that many people have of Hugh Hefner—dressed in a smoking jacket, with a pipe in one arm, and a few ladies on the other. The classic Hefner image has been brought to life with a modern twist inside the Playboy Club which offers masculine lounge areas, fireplaces, and even gaming areas with Playboy bunnies acting as dealers.
It isn’t hard to see why Hef loves Vegas (or why Vegas loves him). His party-all-the-time, live-in-the-moment attitude is everything that Las Vegas is built on. Hef’s ideals of openness about human-sexuality are a fantasy that many of us can’t practice in our everyday lives. However, in Vegas anything goes and what man (or maybe even woman) alive wouldn’t love to live like Hugh Hefner—even if just for one night.
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