The Cherokee Casino, located in Tulsa, Okla., is a seven-story hotel that includes 80,000 square feet of gaming space. The striking interior of the was designed to truly bring the look and feel of Las Vegas to Oklahoma.
The interior design features traditional elements such as Cherokee symbols, while simulataneously incorporating the art deco style for which Tulsa is famous. The inclusion of many curved soffitts and themeing elements that rely heavily on compund radiuses further contributue to the Las Vegas allure found throughout the Oklahoma Casino.
The general contractor was The Flintco Companies, based in Tulsa. It is the largest Native American–owned construction company in the world with more than 800 employees nationwide.
According to subcontractor and AWCI member Billy Tobey, vice president and general manager of Green Country Interiors, “Building the Cherokee Casino was a very demanding project due to numerous obstacles presented to us form the start. The first hurdle we had to overcome was the intricate design and value engineering process. We had a basic set of drawings at the outset that ewre incomplete in the area of details, plus we were challenged to find a way to save money without sacrificing the integrity of the final appearance. This was extremely difficult to accomplish due to the many varying curves, radiuses and integrated themeing elements.”
Materials involved on this job included more than 200,000 square feet of exterior insulation and finish systems from Senergy, 200,000 square feet of thermal protection from Johns Manville, 900,000 square feet of USG wallboard, 11,500 linear feet of metal track from Flex-Ability Concepts, and 500,000 linear feet of metal studs made by Clark Metals.
Tobey also pointed out that the next challenge was trying to complete the project on a very tight schedule with an extreme amount of day-to-day design changes. We relied on the experience and expertise of our foremen to use their know-how to achieve all of these goals without sacrificing quality. Their intense involvement and supervision was a critical factor in accomplishing the tasks at hand. We believe we met all the challenges.”
