Las Vegas Review-Journal (Sunday)

VGK’s Marchessau­lt and family plant roots

Couple remodel Summerlin custom home

- By Susan Stone Real Estate Millions

One of Las Vegas’ most celebrated new residents, Golden Knights forward Jonathan Marchessau­lt, has found the perfect place to spend time off the ice.

Marchessau­lt and his wife, Alexandra, graciously invited Real Estate Millions into their Summerlin home, on her birthday, no less. The home was buzzing with three children, ages 9 months to 4; family members and a team representa­tive trying to facilitate our interview.

The house, located in Canyon Fairways, is on a one-third acre custom lot with a greenbelt view and was built in 2001. It has all the space and potential a family of five — soon to be six, they just announced — could wish for, including six en suite bedrooms, two powder rooms, two fireplaces, formal living and dining rooms, family room, pool and outdoor kitchen.

They bought the two-story, 6,600-square-foot house last March after Marchessau­lt signed a six-year extension of his contract with the Knights worth $30 million, and they say they’re planning to live here for a very long time. They love the area and wanted a home where all their children could have their own rooms.

“We like to do a little design for every kid,” Marchessau­lt said. “They have their own personal space, which we really like about the house.”

Their 2-year-old daughter, Victoria, has a room that is painted pink and purple and holds a canopy bed.

“She has the biggest bathroom, because at some point, she’s gonna need it, if she’s like her mom,” he said, joking that Victoria walks about the house with a backpack filled “with makeup, a cellphone, a couple credit cards … the usual.”

With two of the bedrooms on the first floor, it is a multigener­ational house, and family members have already made use of them. All of the bedrooms are a good size, including the master, at 20-feet-by-18-feet.

In a Jan. 21 Las Vegas Review-Journal interview, Marchessau­lt said one of his strategies is to not over-think his game, to just stick to the basics.

That appears to be the strategy the couple have applied in their approach to making the house their own.

They didn’t hire a designer, Alexandra Marchessau­lt said, because: “We know what we want. We have similar tastes, and we used to remodel houses (in their native Quebec).” But they left the actual work to be done by profession­als, Jonathan Marchessau­lt said, “because I’m not that much of a handyman.”

The family is well into a full remodeling of the house, and they plan tackling a few DIY landscape projects this summer when their children go off to camp.

“We don’t know anything about it, but we will try,” he said.

Restoratio­n Hardware is their goto resource for design inspiratio­n.

They have updated the two downstairs powder rooms with new cabinets and fixtures and added a black-and-white floral wallpaper.

A first-floor gym and office were combined into a large playroom where the children have space to do crafts or shoot hoops. They also created a mini-hockey rink on the patio, where James, their oldest son, butts sticks with his famous father, when he’s not taking lessons at City National Arena, where the Golden Knights practice.

The carpeting on the main floor was replaced with wood flooring, blending with the original marble floors and new light fixtures.

The kitchen layout works for them, so they kept it intact, but the mahogany cabinets didn’t, so they painted them white. The sink, backsplash and granite countertop­s were replaced with clean, contempora­ry choices. Overall, the home has a casual, light feel, expansive but without any sense of clutter — something that’s hard for parents with three children in residence to pull off.

They want to redo all of the bathrooms on the upper floor next, especially the spacious master bath, which has the original elevated spa tub with separate shower and original granite countertop­s. It has an exterior balcony with a lovely view of the backyard pool and greenbelt.

With all the time Marchessau­lt spends on the road, he said he prefers to spend time at home rather than going out a lot.

“I’m a big fan of cooking and staying home with the kids,” he said. He added that he especially enjoys summertime barbecues held after the children have their in-home swimming lessons.

Their community offers a swimming pool and tennis courts, so they haven’t felt the need nor had the time to join the nearby TPC Summerlin Golf Club.

For their first Christmas in the new house, they erected a tall tree in the home’s two-story, cupola-topped foyer and invited teammates Reilly Smith, Cody Eakin, Nick Holden and Jon Merrill, who had no family in town, over for Christmas dinner.

When asked how they feel their home stacks up against some of the other Knights’ residences they’ve visited, they disregarde­d the opportunit­y to brag, saying that their tastes are all different.

“Everyone has a really nice house. I would move in every one. There’s not a bad one,” Alexandra Marchessau­lt said. What matters, they agreed is, “everyone makes it their own.”

The home will be theirs as long as the family lives in Las Vegas, she insisted.

“With the kids, it’s the perfect setup for us. We like it here. It’s a good neighborho­od, there’s a lot of trees. We’re not moving,” she said.

 ?? Bill Hughes Real Estate Millions ?? Golden Knights forward Jonathan Marchessau­lt and his family moved into this Summerlin home in March.
Bill Hughes Real Estate Millions Golden Knights forward Jonathan Marchessau­lt and his family moved into this Summerlin home in March.
 ??  ?? Jonathan and Alexandra Marchessau­lt with their children, from left, William, James and Victoria, at their Summerlin home.
Jonathan and Alexandra Marchessau­lt with their children, from left, William, James and Victoria, at their Summerlin home.
 ??  ?? The kitchen has a unique-shaped island.
The kitchen has a unique-shaped island.
 ??  ?? James Marchessau­lt plays on a mini-hockey rink on the patio.
James Marchessau­lt plays on a mini-hockey rink on the patio.

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