Manoir Rowville-Campbell: Nearly sixty marriages have been annulled

Nearly sixty couples have been left without a place to celebrate their wedding as the Rowville-Campbell manor in Mont-Saint-Hillier closed without notice.

“I’m swaying between solution mode, panic and crying,” said Pierre Letorno, who is getting married in Manor next August.

Last Tuesday, his friend Julian Chaumillan received a call from the establishment announcing its final and immediate closure.

Their wedding, like almost sixty other couples, could not be celebrated there.

The Letorno-Choumilan couple had to turn around for a penny to pronounce their vows and find a new place to welcome their 100 guests.

“We’ve been on a five – month notice Booked Friday to Sunday, May to October “, M. directs^Me Letorno. She has already contacted over fifty places, in vain.

“It’s hard to move it to ten minutes past midnight. When I found out, I put down the phone and started looking elsewhere. It’s very stressful, ”said Isabelle Ferland, who learned about the closure of the manor during a call with her florist this week.

“Requests are coming in on an industrial scale. […] People are crying on the phone, “said Daniel Fortin, manager of Maplewood Manor in Waterloo.

Hard to find

Although some couples have had to postpone their weddings several times since March 2020 due to the epidemic, the bride and groom may find it difficult to find a similar venue with the same amenities this summer.

This is especially the case with Nancy Lefebvre and Martin Howard, who reserved 23 rooms in the Rowville-Campbell mansion for their wedding in May, which was originally planned for last year.

“We went to visit hotels, but there was nothing to support it,” she laments.

In the meantime, she has reserved space in a hotel on the edge of the highway in Saint-Hyacinth.

“For my wedding night, I’m going to be in the living room with a small shower. There is no bridal cache […] My house is more luxurious than the hotel I go to! M.^Me Lefebvre.

Sudden closure

Daniel Fortin, who has been in the event business for over 20 years, said: “This is the worst case scenario I’ve ever seen, where the ax fell so quickly and so sharply.

The Rowville-Campbell building, once owned by Yvonne Deschamps and Judy Richards, sold in October 2021 for $ 28 million.

Employees at the time said it was almost impossible for the bride and groom to sell the building before their wedding.

If such a transaction happens, “it is [n’aurait] We want to respect the agreements already in place so there will be no impact on future events, ”according to an exchange of emails they contacted at the time. Newspaper.

The Rowville-Campbell mansion is still not sold, but the owners, Group Jesson G5, have ceased operations. Employees fired.

“The announcement will be made in June. We’re not going to go into the details of Manor’s use because we are in secret deals, ”said Michelle Desreviers, Group Finance’s Vice President.

– With Catherine Lamontagne