When the new owners of the historic building at 7400 W. 79th St. first signed their lease at the end of 2023, they had their work cut out for them.
The downtown Overland Park building has lived many lives. In the early 1900s, the Strang Line Car Barn and Power Plant served the Interurban Railway there, which facilitated Johnson County’s development by transporting passengers between Kansas City, Missouri, and Johnson County, Kansas.
Following that, the 6,700-square-foot building was most recently home to Traditions Furniture, which closed in early 2023.
It had been vacant for several months by the time that Tacia, Doug and Keegan Glade and Brooklen Lewis set out to transform it into the wedding venue it is now.
After completing a year of lengthy renovations, Stone Manor’s first season of weddings and events is in full swing. It marks a new chapter that the owners say they’re excited to be the stewards of.
The new venue hosts weddings and other events
Tacia and Doug Glade, their son, Keegan Glade, and their friend and business partner, Brooklen Lewis, discovered that the building was for sale in 2023.
At the time, the four of them had already been dreaming up ways to open a wedding venue. They all grew up in the Kansas City area, and they said the former Traditions building and its historic charm had long stood out to them.
“I was actually always just naturally drawn to the building,” Tacia said. “You don’t usually find a historic building like this in the suburbs — you usually have to go downtown to get a high-character building.”
Renovating the building was no small feat, from removing obsolete HVAC and plumbing systems to restoring the building’s original wood ceilings and adding in new chandeliers.
But as self-acclaimed “real estate and architecture geeks”, Tacia and Doug had plenty of visions for Stone Manor’s transformation, and they were eager to take the project on.
“It just needed a lot of repair and just to be revived, and that was right up our alley,” Tacia said. “Being able to revitalize and just make the natural beauty of the building shine was exciting to me.”
Stone Manor has already hosted multiple weddings
So far, five events have already taken place at Stone Manor this year. Beyond that, the group expects to have about two dozen events under their belt by the end of 2025.
The 6700-square-foot space has the capacity for roughly 300 guests.
People have mostly booked Stone Manor for wedding receptions so far, with some wedding ceremonies and corporate events mixed in.
“We have people here probably almost on a daily basis trying to get in, just so they can see what’s going on,” Tacia said. “The community really is excited to see it revived, and they have memories of this place.”
It wasn’t long after they signed their lease at Stone Manor that they began to give tours and fill their books with event reservations. So it’s been a special time, the group said, because Stone Manor’s first few clients have been along for the ride since the before renovations began and had the chance to see the building transform alongside them.
“We’ve been kind of in a unique position for these first few weddings, because they’ve been with us literally since the beginning,” Lewis said. “For them to walk through the whole process of when it was a furniture store and see the renovations and then to their actual wedding day, we spent a lot of time together.”
Stone Manor’s first guests say they’ve enjoyed the transformation
Sarah Lewis, who got married at Stone Manor at the end of May, was one of the first brides to experience Stone Manor for herself after its renovations. (Sarah Lewis is unrelated to Brooklen Lewis, one of the owners.)
Its “rustic” charm, despite technically being a brand new venue, was part of what she said made it appealing to her.
“Living so close to the venue, we loved driving by and looking at the progress,” she said. “I also work at Tomahawk Elementary just down the street, and I would always get updates from coworkers looking through the window. It was so fun to see the progress.”
Sarah’s mother, Meg Lewis, also remembers her awe with the finished result on the day of her daughter’s wedding — along with recognizing the effort that went into it.
“We’d seen it several times close to the end, but when we saw it on the day of, it was just amazing,” she said. “We just felt like we were in a family’s home. (The Glades) just love it so much and take such pride in it.”
Being part of days like that is the most exciting part of this for Stone Manor’s owners. That’s what they say they look most forward to continuing.
“It’s a good feeling when you work really hard at something, and you can see someone else enjoy it for what you built it for,” Keegan Glade said. “It’s just a really cool experience being able to work with so many different kinds of people coming from so many different kinds of backgrounds, (who are) all really coming together for the sole purpose of celebrating people.”
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