{"id":1353,"date":"2009-03-01T23:05:34","date_gmt":"2009-03-02T07:05:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/?p=1353"},"modified":"2026-02-19T10:05:17","modified_gmt":"2026-02-19T18:05:17","slug":"a379-las-vegas-tiki-culture-artifact","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/?p=1353","title":{"rendered":"#a379 :: Las Vegas tiki culture artifact"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/03\/030109.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-1354\" title=\"030109\" src=\"http:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/03\/030109-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"030109\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" align=\"right\" srcset=\"https:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/03\/030109-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/03\/030109-300x300.jpg 300w, https:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/03\/030109.jpg 500w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><\/a>The <a href=\"www.critiki.com\/cgi-bin\/location.cgi?loc_id=304\">Aku-Aku Restaurant<\/a> opened in 1960 inside the much-fabled <a href=\"http:\/\/www.google.com\/url?sa=U&amp;start=1&amp;q=http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Stardust_Resort_%26_Casino&amp;ei=2ZGrSaDFE4GStQPY8YDoDw&amp;sig2=ENOsWiycvce_2GTwPfsuog&amp;usg=AFQjCNFKMWHu2N1HrR5O-pRDgcAT-CQJhw\">Stardust Casino<\/a> in Las Vegas.<\/p>\n<p>When the Stardust was <a href=\"http:\/\/www.google.com\/url?sa=U&amp;start=8&amp;q=http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2007\/03\/13\/us\/13cnd-casino.html%3F_r%3D1%26hp%26oref%3Dslogin&amp;ei=2ZGrSaDFE4GStQPY8YDoDw&amp;sig2=HhNpt6eRWX03j24aAl7Oqw&amp;usg=AFQjCNG1BpvwCORSN6tG-RfYWiaHL5aMXQ\">imploded in 2007<\/a>, mob-culture journalist Nick Pileggi called it &#8220;the Bellagio of its day, the most dazzling casino out there.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The Aku Aku ran for 20 years \u2013 a veritable temple of tiki culture (Here&#8217;s its <a href=\"http:\/\/www.arkivatropika.com\/cgi-bin\/item.cgi?item_id=235\">appetizer menu<\/a>).<\/p>\n<p>My step-father-in-law, who has a massive Vegas collection both in cabinets and in his head, very generously gave me this today. (Thanks, Lee!)<\/p>\n<p>I don&#8217;t know whether this fellow is laughing or grimacing, but he&#8217;s the real deal &#8211; a rough-hewn head in wonderfully scratchy ceramic.<\/p>\n<p>He&#8217;s now living in a place of honor, among the <a href=\"http:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/?p=711\">other shrunken heads<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Aku-Aku Restaurant opened in 1960 inside the much-fabled Stardust Casino in Las Vegas. When the Stardust was imploded in 2007, mob-culture journalist Nick Pileggi called it &#8220;the Bellagio of its day, the most dazzling casino out there.&#8221; The Aku Aku ran for 20 years \u2013 a veritable temple of tiki culture (Here&#8217;s its appetizer [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,7,37,25,19,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1353","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art","category-artifact","category-ephemera","category-facsimile","category-fetish","category-symbol"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1353","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1353"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1353\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1813,"href":"https:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1353\/revisions\/1813"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1353"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1353"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/heavylittleobjects.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1353"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}