About Schwarz Barn
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This is our story. We are Jared and Jamie Schwarz and we are the owners and operators of Schwarz Barn. We got married in 2005 and began our family right away. We have 3 daughters, Morgan, Ella, and Laney. We have always lived in Grantfork but knew we wanted to be in the country, so we bought this property in January of 2012. Jared’s grandparents are the late Frances and Al Luitjohan who owned this property years prior and Jared wanted to buy it to get it back in the family. After we bought the property we immediately started renovations on the house. We gutted and remodeled the inside and were moved in on memorial weekend of 2012. We started working on cleaning up the 1934 2-story dairy barn in November 2012. We started just by first cleaning out the barn. In the lower half part of the original cow and horse barn area we tore out all the old walls and concrete and poured new concrete in January 12, 2013.
In the summer of 2013 we tore down the milking parlor off the barn because it was not salvageable. We then added a new addition in the same spot in the spring of 2014 and that become the kitchen and our personal bar area. Now this area is used for the food line, gift table, etc. At that time we added 3 dormers in the upstairs hay loft and added new tin to the front of the barn and roof line. In 2014 we also added a concrete pad and 2 grain bins behind the barn and added a gravel parking lot on the north side of the barn for grain unloading and wedding parking. In the early stages of cleaning up the barn Adam Mollett and Heather Brown (we didn’t know them at the time) pulled into our driveway and had heard through the grapevine that we were fixing up an old barn (which we were originally just fixing up for a family party barn) and that is exactly what they were looking for, for their wedding venue. They asked if they could have their wedding here at the barn in June of 2014. We were a little shocked at this request and came to find out that barn weddings are very popular right now. We happily agreed to let them have their wedding here and that is kind of how it all started. They paid for their wedding by doing labor here before their wedding. We supplied the materials and Heather’s parents installed the upstairs banister and they helped out with a lot of cleaning.
Our first year (2014) we only had 3 weddings. In 2015, in the back free stall shed which is attached to the main barn we tore out pens prior to pouring new concrete and that opened up more room for a main reception area and dance floor. That year we had 13 weddings. In 2016 we had 20 weddings. We also were in the process of becoming zoned in 2015 through the county and they said we had to add ada restrooms that had to be completed by 2017 so in July of 2016 we began another addition to the east side of the free stall barn. We added restrooms, men and women’s dressing rooms, a bar area, and more reception area. In 2017 we removed the east wall of the free stall barn to open up the room to the new addition. In 2018, we added a 5 acre lake on the south side of the barn.
We are now a fully operating wedding venue and are known as Schwarz Barn. We are a seasonal venue and as of right now only have weddings about 7-8 months out of the year, March-June and August-November. We typically host around 30 weddings a year on average. We strive to make sure that each and every couple that has their wedding with us has a great experience and a wedding they won’t forget!! We are completely booked for this year but have plenty of openings for 2021. We still have a lot we want to do here and continue to make updates and improvements to the barn and our property. We never could have imagined that we would be doing this but we feel very blessed to be able to and we are enjoying every minute through all the blood, sweat, and tears. We have had great feedback from everyone and wonderful support. We know that Jared’s grandparents Al and Frances Luitjohan are looking down on us and guiding us every step of the way.
