Stand in The Martin's lobby around six on any evening this summer and you'll watch neighbors make the same quiet calculation I make most nights myself: left toward the glass and marble of Crystals, or right toward the flashing marquee of Harmon Corner. For years that choice barely mattered. Both paths across the skybridge dumped you into the same generalized idea of "the Strip." That stopped being true somewhere between April and now.
The covered walkway system that carries Martin residents over Harmon Avenue and Interstate 15 without ever touching a crosswalk hasn't changed its route. What's changed is what's waiting at each end. One fork just got measurably more luxurious. The other just got faster and cheaper. If you've been treating "the walkway" as a single destination, you're missing the fact that it now leads to two retail identities that happen to be remaking themselves at the exact same time.
The Left Fork: Crystals Goes Bigger, Not Wider
On April 28, 2026, LOEWE opened its second Las Vegas location inside The Shops at Crystals. This isn't a satellite boutique tucked between bigger names. It's the Spanish house's largest footprint in the market, with enough floor space to carry a dedicated men's collection the brand hadn't previously brought to the city. Casey Domek, general manager of The Shops at Crystals, called it a store that "further enhances our dynamic mix of luxury stores."
Louis Vuitton didn't wait long to answer. Its Crystals flagship reopened this summer after a full renovation, now spread across two stories. Two of the biggest names on that concourse committed serious new square footage to Las Vegas within roughly ninety days of each other, and that timing tells you more about where Crystals is headed than any single press release could. Walk that side of the bridge for the first time since spring and you are not looking at the floor plans you remember from a year ago.
The Right Fork: Harmon Corner Resets for Speed
Cross the same bridge system in the other direction and you land at Harmon Corner, the three-story retail block built into the Strip's busiest intersection, spanning just over 110,000 square feet across two acres. It's mid-renovation right now, rebuilding suite layouts on both the street level and the elevated walkway level that ties directly into the bridge network Martin residents use daily.
Here's what's actually landing there before the year is out:
- Bojangles is already open.
- Sbarro is set to open in Q3 2026.
- Tokyo Grand and Go is also slated for Q3 2026.
That's three counter-service tenants turning over inside a single renovation window, layered on top of a lineup that already includes the world's highest-volume Taco Bell Cantina, along with Rainforest Café, Sugar Factory, and Bubba Gump Shrimp Co, the brands that already pull the heaviest foot traffic on that side of the intersection. Harmon Corner isn't trying to compete with Crystals on price point. It's doubling down on speed, and doing it in the same season Crystals is doubling down on luxury.
Why the Fork Actually Matters
This is the part most guides to CityCenter skip entirely, because most of them are written for a visitor staying three nights, not someone who crosses this bridge four times a week. If you live at The Martin, you no longer have to guess which direction solves which problem.
Want to actually browse a genuinely new luxury layout, not the same store you remember from a decade ago? Go left. LOEWE's expanded footprint and Louis Vuitton's rebuilt two-story flagship are both new enough that even longtime Crystals regulars are seeing them for the first time this year.
Want a fast dinner before you head back up to your unit, or a milkshake with a guest who's only in town for the weekend? Go right. Bojangles is already serving, and Sbarro and Tokyo Grand and Go both land by the end of Q3, which means the fast-casual side of your walk is about to get noticeably more interesting without adding a single minute to your walk.
And if what you actually want is neither, there's a third option that's been sitting in the middle of both forks for a while now.
The Middle Ground Nobody Renovated
63 CityCenter, the four-story, 240,000-square-foot building at the corner of Las Vegas Boulevard and Harmon, already houses Jason Aldean's Kitchen + Bar, Ocean Prime's flagship location, the first ARTE MUSEUM to open in the Western Hemisphere, and an international flagship of Museum of Illusions. None of that is brand new this summer, but it's worth remembering it's there precisely because so many residents default to either the luxury fork or the fast fork and forget the entertainment corridor sitting between them. It's also the building with an unobstructed view of the Harmon turn, the corner where Formula 1's Las Vegas Grand Prix generates some of the tightest overtakes on the circuit.
The bigger picture is this. A skybridge that once felt like a single, static amenity is now three distinct experiences stacked within a ten-minute walk of your front door, and two of the three are actively under construction right now. That's not a detail a national listing site or a one-time visitor guide is going to track, because it requires watching the same two blocks change month over month. It's the kind of thing you only notice if you're the one deciding, most nights, which direction to walk.
If you're already living at The Martin, none of this changes your address. It just means the walk you've been taking for granted got more interesting on both ends at once, and it's worth taking both forks at least once before the Harmon Corner renovation wraps and the current mix settles into whatever comes next.
If you're curious what else is shifting in the high-rise towers along this stretch of the Strip, or you want a straight answer on what a specific floor or stack at The Martin is actually worth in today's market, that's the conversation I have with residents and owners every week. Reach out to Steve Gonzalez and we'll set up a private high-rise consultation whenever you're ready.
