American West Homes won a Silver Nugget for its model home kitchen

Winning the best model home kitchen in the $300,000 to $500,000 range at the Silver Nugget Awards was no surprise to American West Homes.

Vice President Danny Welsh said the company’s director of architecture, Malcolm Compton, has worked with the founder and president, Larry Canarelli, for more than 30 years.

“He’s local and in-house so he’s got his finger on the pulse of Las Vegas because he lives here,” Welsh said of Compton. “The founder sits down with him to design all the homes and we gather a lot of feedback from our homeowners so we can tweak and make things better as we go.”

The Silver Nugget Awards honor the Southern Nevada homebuilder community each year. More than 400 people attended the event at Red Rock Resort on March 19. The event is presented by the Southern Nevada Home Builders Association and the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

Judges Vincent Barbato, principal of Family Development Homes; Donald Ruthroff, senior associate and senior architect at Dahlin Group Architecture Planning; and W. Rick Sellers, principal-in-charge and president of CSD, determined the winners in more than 40 categories in the areas of sales and marketing, architecture, floor plans and interior design.

American West Homes won for its Heather kitchen at Woodbridge at Coronado Ranch.

“Our kitchens are our trademark,” Welsh said. “It’s the heart of the home.”

He added that kitchens in American West Homes boast gourmet cook centers with a bay window over the stove as well as a nearly 60-inch granite slab on kitchen islands and an enlarged refrigerator and freezer.

“The bay window allows you to look outdoors while you’re at the stove,” Welsh said. “The size of our kitchen islands gives buyers the opportunity to substitute a dining room table because it sits up to 12 people.”

In the future, Welsh said American West Homes will continue to incorporate large kitchen islands, double refrigerators and freezers as well as gourmet cook centers.

“As families grow and change, I think you’ll see buyers steering away from having a formal dining room,” he said. “Everything is done in the kitchen from prepping food to doing homework.”

He added that though whites and grays are hot color trends in the kitchen at the moment, American West homebuyers are gravitating toward darker cabinet colors.

“We offer enough options so homebuyers can customize their home so it’s unique to their family,” he said. “Leading the industry in kitchen design and accommodating large family gatherings are the most important things for us.”

Welsh said being honored at the Silver Nugget Awards means a lot to the family-owned company that has been around since 1984.

“It’s nice to be recognized as an industry leader because we spend so much time designing and listening to our homeowners,” he said. “It’s encouraging and it helps us keep pushing forward.”

Contact reporter Ann Friedman at afriedman@reviewjournal.com or 702-380-4588. Follow @AnnFriedmanRJ on Twitter.