Marion County has a new gem it can add to its crown after the opening of Lauren Manor, located at 1403 Mississippi 35 South in Sandy Hook, at the end of May.
Lauren Manor Wedding & Event Venue sits on 17 acres of some of the best scenery in the county, and is run by a pair of sisters, Samantha Bracey and Stacy Fortenberry, that are willing and able to meet their guests’ every need.
Bracey and Fortenberry have been in the wedding business for more than a decade and waiting to find a permanent location.
“We decided we wanted to get somewhere stationary because we traveled with a wedding trailer doing weddings,” Fortenberry said. “We decided we wanted a venue and there’s not one in Marion County that we know of that is this size that can accommodate weddings, reunions, events, anything. We’ve already booked reunions and birthday parties, so we do several events besides weddings.”
What makes Lauren Manor unique as a wedding and event venue is its versatility and ability to cater to a multitude of its guests’ needs. By offering catering, hair and makeup for brides, wedding cakes, floral and more, it’s truly a one-stop shop for weddings.
“We’ve been to all these different venues where we’ve done weddings for people and studied what they don’t provide,” Fortenberry said. “When we’ve gone to these other venues and listened to the complaints of what they didn’t have, we tried to incorporate all those things here. With our most recent bridal party, they were very well pleased with what we offer. They said all the other venues they looked at didn’t offer this or they couldn’t do that. We just want to make them feel at home and make sure they’re comfortable.”
On top of what it brings as a wedding location, Lauren Manor will be hosting pageants, bridal and prom shows, business parties and is even considering hosting prom for local schools.
“We have no limit,” Bracey said. “We will accommodate anybody that wants to do anything.”
While Lauren Manor can offer a wedding party with all the necessities, it does not discourage potential guests the freedom to only use the venue.
“Even if you just want to rent the facility, you can rent it and do your own food and everything,” Fortenberry said.
Bracey believes the sisters’ willingness to be there for their guests at every turn makes Lauren Manor stand out.
“I think it’s our customer service,” she said. “We tend to our customers and our guests like they are at our home. We’re really attentive to them. If they break a heel, we fix it. If they rip their dress, we sew it up for them. It’s little things like that — anything they need, we try to accommodate them. A lot of things can happen at events you don’t expect, so we try to be a jack-of-all-trades business.”
“We want you to be comfortable and relax,” Fortenberry added. “We have the family suite with a coffee bar where they can go in and sit in there, relax, play dominoes, have a cup of coffee and make themselves comfortable. Also, the kitchen is fully equipped with pots, pans, everything you need. All you have to do is bring your food in (if the guests have a third-party caterer). Most kitchens at other venues only supply the kitchen and don’t have any cookware or anything. We supply everything — linens, decorations, chairs — that’s all included in your rental.”
Anybody interested in doing a photoshoot on the property is also welcome.
“Brides can have their bridal pictures here for free; we don’t charge,” Bracey said. “Any type of photo shoots, they just have to call us and let us know.”
The 5,000-square-foot Lauren Manor is newly renovated with a rustic yet modern look, featuring a reception hall that seats 200 and has a ton of room both inside and outside.
“We have a bridal suite and another suite upstairs for the groom,” Fortenberry said. “We have accommodations for the bride and groom to spend the night. We would like to eventually add some cabins in the back in case we have some out-of-towners that don’t have a place to stay.”
Bracey and Fortenberry also recently added starry lights to the oak trees hanging over the outdoor wedding location. Several relatives have helped in the renovations to the property to make it truly stunning, but that doesn’t mean they are anywhere close to being content.
“Our first goal is putting another pond in out front of the venue with a gazebo on it,” Bracey said. “We want to build a pavilion out back to have outdoor weddings underneath the pavilion too. We plan on paving a circular driveway and putting up a gate in the front of the property. We want to continue to build and add to it as we go.”
And to think it all started with a love for baking.
“It started with me doing wedding cakes,” Bracey said. “We would go and deliver a cake and they would ask us, ‘What do you think about this?’ We would tell them what we would do and the ideas started to flow. When our children got married, we did their weddings and it just progressed. We started doing more and more, and it’s something we fell in love with and got pretty good at. We love what we do.”
Lauren Manor is named after Bracey’s daughter, who has overcome obstacles her entire life, including outlasting her doctors’ predicting she would never make it past 10 years of age.
“She’s 28-years-old and had a stroke before she was born,” Bracey said. “She’s done all the things the doctors told her she would never do. She has just been an inspiration and a blessing to everybody she has met. She’s always smiling and happy.”
Lauren Manor can be reached by phone at (601) 467-7274 or (601) 740-1115, at its website www.laurenmanor.com and on Facebook.
Pictured Above: Stacy Fortenberry, left, and Samantha Bracey own and operate Lauren Manor. | Photo by Joshua Campbell
