Finally, Las Vegas will have it all: this Friday the first wine auction ever in Sin City will be held at Alex, the flagship restaurant in the Wynn Hotel. Zachy's is putting 367 lots under the hammer, an inventory culled from different sellers that mostly includes Bordeaux, Burgundies and Champagnes.

A percentage of the proceeds will go to support the new Frank Ghery-designed Lou Ruvo Brain Institute. But more glittering than a titanium-clad research center is the auction's setting in Las Vegas. It could mark the westward shift of auctions from New York, which snatched the industry from London ten years ago. Las Vegas buyers are a force in wine auctions – who else but hoteliers and high rollers can afford runaway Bordeaux prices, like the jeroboam of Petrus 1982, estimated at $45,000-$80,000? And what's sold in Vegas might stay in Vegas.

The showstopper is the final lot in the auction, 30 bottles of Screaming Eagle 1996, estimated at $75,000-$100,000. But the record-breakers to watch right now are from Champagne. Take the two half-cases of Krug 1995 Clos d'Ambonnay, estimated at $20,000-$40,000 each, or to press the divide button, over $6,000 for a single bottle. The price is justified: 1995 is the inaugural vintage of Clos d'Ambonnay, only 250 cases were made, and the cases themselves are mahogany. But still, this sets a new standard, allowing other Champagnes, like a case of Roederer Crystal Rose 1996, estimated at $5000 to $7500, to punch above their weight.

And it makes a wine that could be cellared for another 50 years, like the Methuselah of Domaine de la Romanée Conti 1988, estimated at $40,000-$70,000, seem like a bargain.-- OLIVER SCHWANER-ALBRIGHT

READ MORE:
Tiny growers of Champagne offer more than just big-time fizz
Author Michael Frew tastes a $1,000-a-bottle single malt

MV STAT: Cobwebs and fungus are an important feature in Rioja cellars; spiders eat the cork flies and fungus keeps the cellars cool...