Gramercy Mansion: Visiting the Historic Stevenson, MD Estate & How to Get There

Gramercy Mansion is a historic Tudor estate and bed & breakfast on 45 wooded acres in Stevenson, Maryland's Green Spring Valley, about 13 miles — roughly 20–25 minutes — from downtown Baltimore. It's a working bed and breakfast, an event venue, and a piece of real Maryland history all at once — built in 1902 as a wedding gift, later home to a Peace Corps predecessor, and now a private estate hosting weddings, corporate retreats, and overnight guests on the same grounds.

Where Is Gramercy Mansion?

Gramercy Mansion sits at 1400 Greenspring Valley Rd, Stevenson, MD 21153, in Baltimore County's Green Spring Valley — a rural, affluent, historic area known for horse country, rolling hills, and estates like the nearby Green Spring Valley Hunt Club. Stevenson itself is an unincorporated community in the Green Spring Valley Historic District, roughly 12–15 miles northwest of downtown Baltimore and near Stevenson University.

This isn't a venue tucked into a commercial district or a suburban office park — it's a genuine private estate on a winding valley road, which shapes both the character of a visit and, as covered below, how groups should think about getting there.

About the Estate

Gramercy Mansion has a real, documented history that goes well beyond typical "historic venue" copy. It was built in 1902 by Alexander J. Cassatt, president of the Pennsylvania Railroad and brother of the American Impressionist painter Mary Cassatt, as a wedding gift for his daughter Eliza. Later owners included the prominent Brewster family, who lived at Gramercy for some thirty years.

In 1950, the estate took an unexpected turn: it became home to the Koinonia Foundation, a predecessor organization to the Peace Corps, which established Maryland's first organic farm on the property. That farm has operated continuously since 1950 and still supplies culinary herbs to Whole Foods, Giant, and Graul's today — genuinely rare continuity for a property that's changed hands and purposes multiple times over more than a century.

In 1985, current owners Anne and Ron Pomykala purchased and restored the mansion, carriage house, and outbuildings, adding the formal gardens visitors see today. The same ownership later added two related properties — the Carrollton Inn & Plaza in Baltimore City (2007) and Grey Rock Mansion in Pikesville (2018) — worth knowing if either name comes up in the same search, since they're sister properties, not the same location.

Today, Gramercy Mansion operates as three things at once:

• A bed & breakfast with 11 individually furnished guest rooms and suites, several with fireplaces and whirlpool tubs, plus a pool, tennis court, and a complimentary EV charging station on the grounds.
• An event venue — the Mansion's elegantly appointed first-floor rooms, covered terrace, and gardens accommodate up to 150 guests for a seated reception, with a separate brick Carriage House and courtyard offering additional event space.
• A working organic farm, Koinonia Farms, which supplies the herbs used in the B&B's made-to-order breakfasts and wholesales to regional grocery chains.

The estate hosts more than 100 weddings, elopements, parties, and business conferences a year, and its grounds — landscaped gardens and wooded walkways — are as much a part of the draw as the mansion itself. (Exact seated capacities vary by room and event style, so confirm the current figure for your specific setup directly with the venue.)

Getting There: Directions from Baltimore & DC

Gramercy Mansion's own marketing describes it as about 20 minutes from downtown Baltimore and roughly an hour from DC. Independently sourced route data lines up closely on Baltimore and suggests the DC estimate can run a bit longer depending on route and traffic:

The final approach runs along Greenspring Valley Road itself — a two-lane, winding road through the historic valley, passing directly alongside the Green Spring Valley Hunt Club. It's a scenic route, but a genuinely different driving experience from a highway approach to a commercial venue, especially after dark or for a driver unfamiliar with the area.

Staying On-Site: The Bed & Breakfast

One thing that genuinely differentiates Gramercy Mansion from a typical event venue is that a meaningful share of your guest list can simply stay on the property. The B&B's 11 guest rooms and suites are individually furnished with antiques, several with fireplaces or whirlpool tubs; all rooms include complimentary Wi-Fi, cable TV, and in-room refrigerators and microwaves, with a made-to-order full breakfast each morning featuring herbs from the on-site farm.

For a wedding or event, this changes the transportation math directly: guests staying on-site don't need transportation to the venue at all — they're already there. The real planning question becomes how to move the remaining guests — the portion of the list not staying at the 11-room B&B — to and from the estate, especially if they're coming from Baltimore, DC, or elsewhere and staying at an off-site hotel.

If you're searching for hotels near Gramercy Mansion because the on-site B&B's 11 rooms aren't enough for your full guest list, the practical answer is that most additional lodging is in nearby Towson, Pikesville, or downtown Baltimore — all roughly 15–25 minutes away by car — rather than immediately adjacent to the estate.

Getting Groups There

Between the estate's private, winding-road access and the reality that most events involve at least some guests coming from off-site hotels rather than the 11-room B&B, group transportation solves a specific problem here: getting a full guest list safely up and down Greenspring Valley Road without a long line of individually driven cars all arriving and departing at once, especially for an evening event ending after dark.

This is a different logistics story than a downtown venue's street-closure problem or a remote waterfront venue's long individual drive — it's about coordinating group movement on a narrow, private-feeling estate road, which is exactly the kind of situation a Baltimore car service or shuttle handles more smoothly than a stream of separate cars. Guests flying in can be met at the airport the same way, since BWI is only about 30 minutes out and BWI car service drops them straight at the estate. (A dedicated guide on wedding-specific transportation logistics for Gramercy Mansion — hotel-block shuttle planning, timing, and group sizing — is coming as a follow-up; this guide covers general estate visitor and event planning.)

Frequently Asked Questions