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City Cast Las Vegas

Keep It Local

Keep It Local by City Cast Las Vegas features spotlights on local businesses we love and personal, curated, and neighborly recommendations that will help you live your best Las Vegas life right now. So, if you’re ready to ditch the national chains, e-commerce giants, and big box stores,

sign up now for the new weekly newsletter from City Cast Las Vegas, written by Melinda Sheckells.

Sign up for Keep It Local from City Cast Las Vegas

Melinda Sheckells

A quick pick-me-up, party inspiration, or because you deserve your flowers: There are worse reasons to pick up your phone and start “bloomscrolling” — our term for browsing beautiful floral creations on social media. These four local floral businesses give us a pretty place to land on Instagram, with creations ranging from a rose-made piano to bouquets with astrological ambitions. Follow for the eye candy. Save for your next celebration. Order just because.

 ranges from arrangements for Phish’s residency at Sphere, with electric-blue flower spikes, yellow roses, and bold orange blooms to compact, delicate white bridal bouquets. Las Vegas native Jessica Marshall traded fashion buying in New York for floral design and returned home to open the studio in 2014. Her signature “low and lush” style packs arrangements with color and texture, while her projects offer plenty of celebrity-adjacent flowermaxxing. She also supplied the red rose bouquets for 

 promoting The Romantic Tour, complete with wrapping bearing the singer’s image.

 delivery seven days a week — handy when you remember the food but forget the flowers.

Founded in Las Vegas in 2020 by Erin Hancock and Haley Ives, 

 calls itself “floral visionaries.” Scroll through their glossy anthuriums, cascading orchids, and trailing amaranthus, and you’ll understand why. Unexpected color combinations, feathery flourishes, and long ribbons give the arrangements big showgirl energy, while personal touches such as polaroids and disco balls make each creation feel like it has a story.

 With satin heart backdrops, velvet curtains, and bouffant-haired brides posing beneath cheeky roadside signs, their feed doubles as a mood board for a 

What do you send John Legend on the opening night of his residency? If you’re Wayne Newton and his wife, Kat, you'd send him 

. Their gift marked the opening of Legend’s Planet Hollywood residency, and it’s the sort of floral showmanship worth scrolling 

 to see how those elaborate scenes come together.

Shopping for someone who checks their horoscope before their email? 

 translates astrological signs into arrangements: 

moody plum calla lilies and blush roses for Pisces

, orchids and seashell accents for Cancer, soft pink and lavender blooms for Libra. Led by creative director Michelle Joy, the family-owned Las Vegas design house goes equally big on drama: clouds of peach-colored roses, cascading white orchids, and wedding installations that graduate from deep pink to white.

 and collect ideas for making flowers part of the room itself — useful inspiration for a party entrance, photo backdrop, or wedding ceremony.

Need a pick me up? Bloomscroll these four local feeds for showgirl-worthy orchids, a rose piano for John Legend, and zodiac-inspired bouquets. 

Best Las Vegas Floral Artists to Follow on Instagram

Bloomscroll These Las Vegas Floral Artists

For Nate Guerrero, floral design starts with a blank canvas, the empty room or scene he will adorn. “I like to reference and study architecture,” he says. “So that plays into how I build the flowers.”

He’s drawn to the shape of calla lilies and the way amaranthus drapes through an arrangement — materials that let him explore proportion, color, and movement.

 brings that same eye to photography, tablescapes, and interiors. But clients often first encounter his work through flowers.

Guerrero developed his visionary creative technique while helping build other Las Vegas businesses. At the trendsetting boutique Fruition, he did editorial photography; at Fruits and Roots, he incorporated flowers into food presentations. Along the way, he recognized how much he wanted to pursue creative work himself.

Elev8 became a way to bring those interests together under his own business.

, a studio he helped open last year with owner Jenny Yi. As a managing partner, he works in the plant studio creating settings for photo shoots, from maternity sessions to family portraits.

That thinking carries into his events: Every petal belongs to a larger experience. His work also includes styling homes and decorating clients’ Christmas trees.

Weddings hold particular meaning. He sees those commissions as an invitation into one of the happiest moments of someone’s life, with listening as much a part of the job as arranging stems.

“I love honoring my clients,” he says.

Flowers offer a starting point for that relationship, with room to grow. “If you trust me with this,” Guerrero says, “we can do so much more.”

For Nate Guerrero, a room isn’t alive until it has flowers. The Elev8 Agency founder shares how listening to clients shapes every wedding and event

Meet Nate Guerrero, a Las Vegas Floral and Event Designer

The Las Vegas Book Festival returns Saturday, Oct. 17, with authors including Krista Diamond, Nicholas Russell, and Jon Ralston 

 from making a living as a writer to Harry Reid’s complicated legacy. Add Isaiah Sky Orlen’s exploration of spiritual growth to the stack (who won't be at the festival, but still makes Las Vegas proud), and these four local authors offer very different ways to turn the page.

,” a wildlife photographer trades his original ambitions for a Las Vegas celebrity chase. Now a Los Angeles paparazzo, Ben becomes consumed by a movie star caught in a scandal. The story moves through Las Vegas, Los Angeles, and the desert between them, examining the uneasy distance between watching someone and believing you know them.

 at the Las Vegas Book Festival when she joins Nicholas Russell, Erin Singer and Maile Chapman for “Writing Life: Working & Living as a Writer Today,” noon-1 p.m. in the Downtown Tent. Aspiring authors can hear about agents, editing, and building a writing career.

An abandoned Nevada observatory is an excellent place to begin a very bad night. In Las Vegas writer 

Nicholas Russell’s debut horror novel, “Observer,

” a young woman investigates her mother’s disappearance at just such a place. If October puts you in the mood for unsettling fiction, here’s a local author working with a landscape we know can feel particularly lonely after dark.

 twice at the Las Vegas Book Festival at the working writers panel, then at “How the West Is Told,” 1:30-2:30 p.m. Both take place in the Downtown Tent, with the latter exploring the region through horror, crime fiction, and other literary approaches.

More than a tribute to the man our airport is named after, 

 by longtime Nevada political journalist 

, offers a fuller introduction to former Senator Harry Reid. The biography follows Reid’s rise from Searchlight to Senate leadership, examining his legislative accomplishments, combative tactics, and complicated political legacy.

 at the Las Vegas Book Festival in conversation with journalist Steve Sebelius for “Harry Reid Then and Now,” 12:30-1:30 p.m. in the auditorium.

Higher Frequencies: Journey to Enlightenment

What happens when the habits that helped us survive begin to limit how we live? Las Vegas author 

Isaiah Sky Orlen’s “Higher Frequencies: Journey to Enlightenment”

 explores that tension through three archetypes: the Victim, the Survivor, and the Warrior. Connecting spiritual practice to relationships and everyday choices, Orlen asks readers to consider how they respond to hardship — and whether those responses still serve the people they want to become.

 Prefer to listen? Orlen narrates the audiobook himself, 

. At just under 6.5 hours, you can work it into a week of morning walks or commutes.

From a paparazzo’s desert obsession to Harry Reid’s complicated legacy, these hometown writers explore Nevada’s complex stories. 

Books by Las Vegas Authors to Read this Fall

Mark Gray went to an Angels baseball game in Anaheim to interview survivors of Las Vegas’ Route 91 tragedy for Rolling Stone magazine. That outing would transform him from journalist to author.

Mary Jo von Tillow had lost her husband, Kurt, in the Oct. 1, 2017, shooting. Gray survived it himself. She sat near Gray at the baseball game that day. Their initial conversation was brief; they exchanged numbers, but about a year later, she called. She had an idea, and she wanted a writer who truly understood.

The Las Vegas Massacre Connections: Finding Strength Through Tragedy After America’s Deadliest Mass Shooting,”

 published last year, follows Mary Jo and the relationships she formed afterward. Gray interviewed her children, friends, and people whose own experiences with loss had brought them into her life.

With Mary Jo, he moved between reporter and fellow survivor. He remembered the sounds of bullets and the fear of being helpless on the ground. Their experiences differed, but that shared understanding made the conversations possible.

“The book was very much a cathartic process for me,” Gray says.

Writing it took nine months. Finding a publisher took about nine more. Gray, an entertainment writer for decades, pulled up his records: He pitched the book 251 times. He estimates about 25 pitches received feedback.

WildBlue Press accepted it while he was meeting friends for dinner in New York. After so many unanswered emails, he wondered whether he had read it correctly. “It was an absolutely incredible feeling,” he says.

A year after publication, Gray measures the book’s impact partly through the people who have contacted him. Some wanted to thank him. Others wanted help telling their own stories. Those conversations have strengthened his connections within the survivor community.

He is now working on a second book, this time fiction, with a more patient understanding of what the process requires. For anyone trying to finish a manuscript of their own, his advice is simple: “Give yourself a lot of grace.”

A chance meeting at an Angels game led journalist Mark Gray to tell a Route 91 widow’s story. Now he’s sharing what writing it taught him about grace.

Route 91 Survivor Mark Gray on Writing His First Book

Toni James has spent nearly four decades working a room. James began performing drag professionally in 1988, first as Diana Ross, then as Miss Gay Seattle XXIX. In the 1990s, the entertainer moved into one of Las Vegas drag’s most coveted rooms, joining Kenny Kerr’s legendary Boy-Lesque at the Sahara. In 2021, James added another title to the resume: legal wedding officiant. More than 100 ceremonies later, that second act has become its own business, 

Here is a bit of numerology: James had been a working drag performer for more than 25 years before Clark County issued its first marriage license to a same-sex couple on Oct. 9, 2014. Twelve years later, Las Vegas Pride kicks off on that same date. Then, on Saturday, Oct. 17, James will stand on the 

 main stage and officiate a group wedding at 6:15 p.m., helping couples make their marriages official.

It brings together two things Las Vegas knows particularly well: putting on a show and, as the world's wedding capital, getting people married.

 with the required Clark County paperwork or join for a symbolic commitment or vow renewal. Legal participants pay a $100 ceremony fee plus a separate $102 Clark County marriage license fee. Symbolic participation is free. James signs the paperwork and personally delivers the completed marriage certificate to the Clark County Clerk’s Office the next business day.

There’s plenty of spectacle, but there's also something to be truly proud of: People who once couldn’t legally marry in Nevada can now do it publicly at Pride, with a drag queen signing the paperwork.

Las Vegas drag superstar Toni James has performed since 1988. Now, as a wedding officiant, he’ll marry couples onstage at the 2026 Las Vegas PRIDE Festival.

Meet Toni James, the Drag Queen Marrying Couples at Las Vegas Pride

A parade makes it easy to see and experience Pride, but the more important question is what supporting queer Las Vegas looks like after everyone goes home.

That’s why this isn’t a list of places that put a rainbow cocktail on the menu for October. These businesses have a deeper connection to the community: LGBTQ+ ownership, spaces intentionally built to be inclusive, regular queer programming or, in the case of Analog Dope, a business whose survival matters to the community it created.

Buy a book, meet a friend for boba, take your first pole class or somehow find yourself eating at a gay bar at 4 a.m.

Married owners Rachelle “Analog LUST” Luster and Cierra “Charlie Muse” Luster built their Black women- and 

 and record shop around Black culture, the African diaspora, and writers of color. The vinyl selection runs from jazz and soul to hip-hop, R&B, and reggae. An Aug. 18 fire devastated the physical shop, but Analog Dope is still operating online as they figure out what comes next.

 means more than convenience. Shop books, audiobooks, and Analog Dope merch, or 

contribute directly to the shop’s recovery

 offers a fully plant-based menu of milk teas, fruit teas, smoothies, coffee, and snacks. But Afterlife has also become a gathering place. The 

Southern Nevada Asian Pacific Islander Queer Society

 meets here on the first Wednesday of each month. It hosts book clubs, cupsleeve events, and an Artist Nook where local creators can display their work and keep 100% of their sales.

 Happy hour is buy one drink, get a second 50% off every day (times vary).

 is a downtown movement studio offering pole, aerial arts, yoga, Pilates, and other classes for adults. Its inclusion policy gets refreshingly specific. Students are welcome regardless of gender identity, physique, experience, ability, race, or age. The studio explicitly prohibits racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, body shaming, and sex-worker shaming.

 First-timers can try a class for $11. If you’ve never touched a pole outside a nightclub, Beginner Pole is exactly where you belong. The studio recommends booking at least 12 hours ahead.

 has been around since 2014 and, crucially for anyone whose evening has ever gone off schedule, it’s open 24 hours. Inside, there’s a full kitchen, pool tables, darts, karaoke, patios, and a dance floor.

 This year, Phoenix gets both official Pride closing shifts. After Friday’s parade, the official Night Parade After Party runs from 10 p.m.- 2 a.m. with DJ Ashley Q and an 11 p.m. show hosted by Keyska Diva. There’s no cover, and it’s 21-plus. Then, on Oct. 17, the official Festival After Party starts at 9 p.m., with DJ Ashley Q returning and Keyska Diva and Miranda Glamour hosting the 11 p.m. show. Again, no cover.

Support queer Las Vegas beyond Pride with four LGBTQ+-owned and community-centered businesses for books, boba, movement, and nightlife.

4 LGBTQ+-Owned Las Vegas Businesses to Support Year Round

Where To Spend Your Pride Dollars Year Round

In Las Vegas, where wigs and sequins sometimes qualify as a uniform, the bar for Halloween is already high. These four stores make getting ready part of the fun.

 at 3920 W. Charleston Blvd., Suite F, is a useful first stop whether you have a costume planned or just need a wig. The family-owned shop carries ready-made looks and accessories, along with theatrical makeup from Ben Nye, Kryolan, and Mehron for transformations. You can assemble an outfit piece by piece or rent a professionally crafted costume.

, with a refundable credit-card deposit equal to the rental price. Pick up is the day before you need it; return it the morning after.

A ’70s costume is a good excuse to buy actual ’70s clothes. At 

, 211 E. Colorado Ave., owner Stephanie Roshto’s selection offers plenty of color and sparkle for a disco look or old-Vegas glamour. Want to be Dolly? Go full Palm Royale? This is where to snap up the real deal. Start here if you enjoy putting outfits together and want something you can also wear after Halloween.

 Already have your main outfit? Bring it along and browse the store for finishing touches, such as the most dramatic cat-eye sunnies and a 

 began selling their Sinister Mom soaps and candles at local craft fairs. Their shop at 4555 S. Fort Apache Road, Suite 106 now offers spooky décor and horror collectibles. Small gifts make browsing particularly tempting: Pick up those $6 “Friday the 13th” mask magnets and $10 “Beetlejuice” lanyards you’ve always wanted to give to trick-or-treaters.

 For Halloween party host gifts, stock up on the 

 ($13 each). Order online for in-store pickup.

, located at 3950 E. Sunset Road, Suite 106. The oddities-and-comics shop sells taxidermy and preserved specimens alongside comics. Browse its domed insect art for the house, or investigate the unmounted specimens if you’d like to make a display yourself.

 The Night Market Before Halloween, Oct. 10, 5-10 p.m., brings local artists and vendors, snacks, and a charity raffle. Want something hands-on sooner? Check availability for the Oct. 3 

, 6-7 p.m. The $65 fee includes the specimen and materials.

From $75 costume rentals and theatrical makeup to haunted tea and real skulls, these four locally owned Vegas shops have your spooky season covered.

Best Halloween Stores in Las Vegas, Nevada

Your Guide to Halloween Shopping in Las Vegas

From bedazzled spider pasties to 30-inch ostrich plumes, 

 makes going all in on a costume a sure bet. Even better, they also sell the supplies you’ll need to keep your creation together once you leave the house.

Costume designer Natali Germanotta Dolan opened the shop in July 2025 with her husband and creative partner, Alex Dolan, and Emmy-winning designer Perry Meek. Germanotta Dolan has helped create 

performance looks for her sister, Lady Gaga

. The business grew out of the founders’ difficulty finding costume materials locally.

Don’t let those credentials intimidate you. Germanotta Dolan wanted beginners to feel comfortable experimenting, with experienced staff to explain the materials. An idea and a few questions are a perfectly good starting point.

For inspiration, browse OSE’s lookbook. The team recreated Sharon Stone’s glittering halter dress from “Casino,” placing the neckline’s rhinestones by hand. Its replica of Cher’s Oscar headpiece for Arizona Broadway Theatre’s “The Cher Show” uses pampas grass to create that towering silhouette. Locally, OSE made the Green Fairy’s organza boa for “Absinthe” and covered Jennifer Lopez’s microphone stand in jet-black Preciosa crystals.

Billing itself as Las Vegas’ only feather store, OSE carries long ostrich plumes for sweeping headpieces. Shorter ostrich drabs offer a more budget-friendly option. Just admit it: You’ve always wanted a fluffy marabou boa.

Bring a garment you want to transform and a reference photo. Start with feathered cuffs or a sparkling neckline. The website’s 

 estimates how many stones to buy for your design.

With a longer lead time in mind, commission a custom costume or bring in a piece for specific alterations and modifications; plus, their sourcing service helps track down elusive materials.

Find OSE at 3550 E. Post Road, Suite 200, open 12:30-6:30 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday.

Go big this Halloween at On Stage Essentials, where pros behind looks for Lady Gaga and 'Absinthe' help beginners add plumes, sparkle, and drama.

On Stage Essentials, Las Vegas’ Costume Supply Shop

A Halloween Costume With a Backstage Pass

A Strip pastry chef opened a neighborhood bakery. An architect built his home here, then helped provide his neighbors with a place to gather. Behind Water Street’s storefronts are people who have made the neighborhood their business and their life. Here are a few you should get to know.

Danish-born Flemming Pedersen worked at nine major Strip properties before opening 

 almost two decades ago. Today, his neighborhood business transforms his doughy past into bread, pastries, and celebration cakes. But it’s really all about the Danish kringles.

 The bakery closes at 3 p.m. Tuesday - Saturday and is closed Sundays and Mondays, so dessert shopping comes before dinner.

Architect Windom Kimsey put down literal roots: He designed and built his home on Water Street. At 

, his neighborhood ambitions meet the hospitality of husband-and-wife team chef Alessandra Madeira and general manager Walter Ciccone.

 A bottle purchased at sister business Azzurra Wine Bar comes with no corkage fee when enjoyed with dinner here.

Richard’s grandmother taught at Basic High, and he visited Henderson as a child. Years later, Linda nudged him to pursue his dream of starting a brewery. 

, opened in April 2016, making this its 10th anniversary year.

 Take a favorite draft home in a 32-ounce crowler, filled and sealed at the brewery. Leashed dogs are welcome on the patio.

A Cambodian refugee who moved to Henderson in 2003, Chanthy Walsh built her restaurant with her family. She also designed 

, herself, giving its mix of Mexican and Asian influences a personal setting.

 Order across the menu: Birria egg rolls, bulgogi fries, and seafood poke nachos show how the kitchen brings those influences together.

From Strip pastry chefs to local architects, discover the passionate people building their businesses and lives right here on Henderson's Water Street.

Meet the People Behind Henderson’s Water Street District

Meet Water Street’s Movers and Shakers

Why is it called Water Street, you ask? The 

 that supplied water to the Basic Magnesium Inc. Plant. The plant opened in 1942 for wartime production, and the surrounding community grew into Henderson.

Water Street runs south from Lake Mead Parkway, with businesses clustered along the main corridor and adjoining side streets. The district has free public parking lots and two public garages. Check the 

 The bakery-bistro makes its pastries in-house and serves breakfast, brunch, and lunch alongside espresso drinks. Settle in with a croissant and coffee before tackling the block.

If a haircut is overdue, there’s a guy for that. 

, offers cuts and shaves. Owner Jorge Reyes began cutting hair at 13 and, in 2012, bought Kelly’s Barber Shop at 18, carrying forward a business whose history dates back to 1956. Call ahead to arrange your chair time.

 deserves a proper browse. Michael Holland’s shop, established in 1983, deals in vintage and estate jewelry, watches, and custom creations. Bring the piece you’ve been meaning to repair, or ask about redesigning something you love but never wear.

 The volunteer-run nonprofit supports student scholarships and mini-grants; its calendar also includes classes and workshops. Discover local artists before deciding what belongs on your own walls.

By Night: Dinner, Wine, and the Gold Mine

Start with Buffalo wings and New York-style pizza at 

 This outpost of the longtime Henderson restaurant makes an easy dinner for friends who want to split a pie.

, is a newer addition to the neighborhood. Live music runs 6-9 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, giving you an early-evening option before moving on.

, which dates back to 1965. Scott Rhiner and The Moanin’ Blacksnakes bring blues and jazz on Friday, Sept. 25; DSJ follows with Southern rock and ’80s funk on Saturday, Sept. 26. Both shows start at 8 p.m.

For a family outing this Friday, catch the free outdoor screening of 

, with the Henderson Symphony Orchestra performing the score live. Activities begin at 6 p.m.; the movie starts at 7.

Discover how Henderson’s Water Street got its name from a 1942 wartime pipeline. Explore the historic district, local businesses, and parking maps today.