Pierrette Alain Lucas.Megan Maundrell/Courtesy of family
Pierrette Alain Lucas: Mother. Nana. Friend. Contrarian. Born Nov. 28, 1940, in Montreal; died March 5, 2026, in Victoria, of medical assistance in dying following a battle with cancer; aged 85.
Pierrette Lucas was a boat rocker and a ground breaker, as likely to overwhelm friends with generosity as she was to shock them with her sharp wit and outrageous opinions, which she shared without apology, judgment be damned.
Pierrette Alain was the eldest of three siblings born to Leo and Blanche Alain. She grew up in Montreal and was always considered to be the cleverest sibling. Upon completing her secondary exams (the equivalent of CEGEP), the professor evaluating Pierrette’s tests gave her a nearly perfect grade – and scribbled his phone number along the top. She never called, but studied at McGill and the Sorbonne until the sudden death of her mother brought her home to Montreal.
Pierrette looked for stability and married Michel Lucas. She soon gave birth to her two sons, Philippe and Marc; however, it wasn’t long before the marriage began to feel more stifling than stable.
Finding herself single again in the early 1970s, she moved to the welcoming community of Nuns’ Island close to downtown Montreal and explored her career options. She worked in the juvenile court, modelled and became a sales executive.
Drawn to Pierrette’s wit and charm, a growing circle of Montreal’s corporate and political elite urged her to consider federal politics. With a bit of prodding she agreed to run in a by-election for the Progressive Conservative Party, coming in a distant third. Nonetheless, her effortless charisma did not go unnoticed and she was soon moving to Ottawa with her two boys to join the leadership team of former prime minister Joe Clark’s press office.
Pierrette loved to entertain and maintained an active social life that sometimes stretched late into the night. On more than one occasion her boys would hear her come home with a friend or two in tow and put on Frank Sinatra at full blast, only to have them scream downstairs, “It’s a school night. … Turn it down!” (Those tables were to turn when Philippe and Marc got older.)
In the mid-1980s, Pierrette was seconded to External Affairs (now Global Affairs Canada). At a time when there were few powerful women in Ottawa, Pierrette put her social skills to work. In 1986 she became Canada’s Consul General to Philadelphia and then Boston, moving her children to official government residences in the U.S. at the tail end of high school, where they enjoyed the benefits of diplomatic immunity during their rambunctious teen years.
She made her way back to Canada in the early 1990s, ultimately taking on the position of Chief of Protocol under former prime minister Brian Mulroney. In this role she welcomed world leaders such as Nelson Mandela, Helmut Kohl, Boris Yeltsin and Ronald Reagan, and flew on Air Force One with then U.S. president George Bush. She also became friends with Mila Mulroney, the prime minister’s fashionable wife, enjoying both her company and some of her designer hand-me-downs for many years.
Following her time at External Affairs, Pierrette worked as the federal representative to the Commonwealth Games in Victoria and then as a consultant and fundraiser for Concordia and Simon Fraser universities, migrating between Vancouver, Montreal and Ottawa.
This period also marked her transition from Mom to Nana. Endlessly contrarian, she dared Emma, Gabby, Sophie, Nolan and Levi, to defy the wishes of their parents and the expectations of broader society. She urged her grandchildren to carve their own paths in life. “Nana rules” meant sleepovers where they ate dessert first, clothes were worn backward and skinny dipping was encouraged.
In 2015, Marc died. For a few years, Pierrette was a shadow of her former self as the loss of her youngest son sank in. Eventually, she moved to Victoria to be closer to Philippe and his family. She made new friends and did new things, like learn it was nearly impossible to get out of a wetsuit.
Three years ago, Pierrette was diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer. Friends and family rallied behind her. True to her take-charge nature, following a short hospice stay, Pierrette chose to end her fight with the disease.
Pierrette Lucas never failed to demonstrate an attitude of respectful defiance to stultified societal norms, and the rewards of constantly reaching for the highest rung, even at the risk of falling.
Philippe Lucas is Pierrette Lucas’s son.
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