Sam Arnaout’s Iris Capital has lodged plans for a $100-million extension and redevelopment of Alice Springs’ iconic Lasseters Hotel Casino below the rugged MacDonnell Ranges.
The new art-style hotel, which will be delivered in multiple stages, will complement the Aboriginal art galleries Alice Springs is famous for and add a second accommodation offering alongside the casino’s existing 4.5-star, 205-key hotel operated by IHG Hotels & Resorts.
A further 235 guest rooms are planned in buildings of up to five storeys. There are also plans to add a residential component to the casino, which was built in 1981 and is one of Alice Springs’ biggest employers.
It will also include extensions to existing gaming areas, bars and restaurants and a new hotel lobby, gym, creche and day spa.
The casino is named after Lasseter’s reef, a purported gold deposit in a remote and desolate corner of central Australia. The mine was allegedly discovered by Harold Bell Lasseter in 1929 and 1930. His accounts of the find are conflicting and its precise location remains a mystery.
The location was also made famous in the 1994 Australian hit movie The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert—about a travelling drag act featuring Hugo Weaving, Guy Pearce and Terence Stamp who performed a nightclub act at the casino.
In April 2021, Sydney-based Iris Capital purchased the property for $105 million from Singapore’s Lasseters International Holdings after the Northern Territory government approved its application to operate the casino.
The casino is at the centre of entertainment in Alice Springs with four restaurants, four bars, a sports theatre, poolside cafe, night club, health club, day spa, TAB facilities and an international standard casino featuring the latest tables and electronic games.
Arnaout, who owns more than 30 pubs, 20 hotels and 1300-plus poker machines, told The Urban Developer Alice Springs deserved world-class facilities and that he was excited that Lasseters would be able to offer that.
“There are significant opportunities available for Alice Springs around tourism,” Arnaout said.
“In particular the economic activity that brings, employment, unmet demand and the opportunity for more people to come and enjoy Alice Springs and Iris Capital wants to promote and participate in that opportunity.”
Iris Capital, which employs 1200 people across the country and turns over in excess of $500 million a year, is one of Australia’s biggest private owners and operators of pubs and hotels.
The group now holds close to 2500 luxury apartments as well as three fully operational vineyards.
Its accomodation portfolio includes 17 Ibis hotels acquired for $180 million in 2020 from AccorInvest. Its pub portfolio includes Manly’s Steyne Hotel and another Manly venue, the Ivanhoe Hotel bought for about $60 million in February.
The group is also undertaking the biggest apartment development in Newcastle’s history and has grand plans on the Gold Coast, where its $800-million redevelopment of the 1980s-era Niecon Plaza is the most valuable project on Broadbeach in over a decade.
The developer also has plans for another 38-storey Broadbeach tower, planned for a narrow 900sq m site at 73 Garfield Terrace.
Earlier this year, it also struck a deal to purchase Casino Canberra for $63 million, outbidding a rival pub group by $5 million.
