One of the most exciting new steakhouses in Las Vegas isn’t on the Strip.
On July 2, grill-loving chef Brad Wise will open Rare Society at the $800 million, 40-acre Uncommons mixed-use development across from the Durango casino.
The Las Vegas debut of Rare Society, which already has two San Diego locations in addition to outposts in Orange County, Santa Barbara and Mill Creek, Washington, solidifies this part of southwest Las Vegas as a dining destination. Uncommons is already home to lively sit-down restaurants Amari and Siempre J.B., alongside more casual spots like All’Antico Vinaio, Urth Caffé, Salt & Straw, Blue Bottle and SunLife Organics. Durango, meanwhile, is where chef Danny Ye’s stellar Nicco’s steakhouse headlines a dining collection that also includes a food hall with Uncle Paulie’s Deli, Prince Street Pizza, Shang Artisan Noodle, Fiorella and Oyster Bar.
Wise never thought he would open in Las Vegas before the Uncommons opportunity emerged, but this opening feels like a full-circle moment. Rare Society, which first debuted in San Diego in 2019, was inspired by Vegas glamour. And the new 5,000-square-foot Rare Society at Uncommons very much wants to invoke the feeling of Rat Pack gatherings in a space with dark wood, honed black stone, hand-stitched leather, polished metal and eye-catching mirrors.
Wise, not surprisingly, plans to go big at his new location with exclusive-to-Vegas Rare Society dishes like a Snake River Farms wagyu tomahawk, Alaskan king crab (available by itself or as part of seafood towers), broiled oysters (with bacon, yuzu-arugula butter and crispy capers), lobster mashed potatoes and summer corn (a riff on elote with chorizo, pasilla peppers and cotija cheese).
And he will, of course, serve the steak boards with assorted cuts and sauces that Rare Society is known for at all its locations.
“When we opened our first Rare Society, it was a failed bar concept that we flipped into a Vegas-inspired steakhouse,” Wise tells Observer. Even then, he was thinking about off-the-Strip sexiness after he visited the Barrymore (which has since closed) in Las Vegas and saw the movie reels on the restaurant’s ceilings.
Wise was also inspired by over-the-top East Coast steakhouses. But one thing that’s made his restaurant stand out is its California roots and the cues it takes from the informality of California’s Santa Maria-style barbecue. For example, Rare Society grills steaks and chars vegetables over red oak.
“I wanted to kind of bridge the gap between the high-end steakhouse and the ultra-casual,” Wise says. “I feel like the wood-fire concept that we have makes it a bit less refined. The meat is cooked in a different style. It’s not this perfect sear under a broiler. The char that you get when you’re using a wood-fired grill is a little bit more difficult.”
Wise has put together ultra-popular steak boards, which he remarkably sells more of than single steaks. The Associate board features an 8-ounce wagyu Denver steak, a 10-ounce piece of tri-tip, a 5-ounce filet mignon, and bone marrow alongside pickle-braised onions and beef-fat butter. Boards also come with housemade sauces like Santa Maria-style salsa (which is tomato-based and features Anaheim peppers, pasilla peppers and onions finished with a little Coca-Cola), classic béarnaise and Rare Society’s steak sauce.
The grander Executive board includes a 22-ounce dry-aged rib eye, a 20-ounce dry-aged bone-in New York strip and an 8-ounce filet mignon. Wise, who has his beef dry-aged in Arizona because the climate is more favorable, makes horseradish cream that he loves to pair with the dry-aged New York strip.
And if you’re looking for surf-and-turf as your main course, Rare Society is putting king crab Oscar on the menu as the chef develops new dishes.
“This restaurant is much more refined than any of the other five locations,” Wise says. His goal is to open something inspired by Las Vegas, but that doesn’t feel like typical Vegas steakhouses.
“You always have this sense of grandeur when you walk into these Las Vegas restaurants with the high ceilings and all these finishes and details where they spent an ultra amount of money,” he says. “At Rare Society, the ceilings are lower. It’s more quaint. It’s a little bit sexier because it’s smaller. The booths are even lower. We sunk the bar in, so you have a different experience when you’re sitting at a dining table and can actually look a bartender in the eye and not stare up at them.”
Maybe that eye contact will remind you to order the restaurant’s signature Old Fashioned, which features dry-aged-fat-washed bourbon and a lardo garnish.
Wise is clearly ready to shake up the steakhouse scene in Las Vegas. “Yes, the finishes and details are still there, but I picked all these details that kind of go the opposite way of the normal Vegas approach,” he says.
Rare Society, located at 6880 Helen Toland St. #100, Las Vegas, NV 89113 will initially be open for dinner Wednesday through Saturday starting July 2, 2025.
