Our Story
A house with a long memory.
Chapter I
The Enger Estate
Marion Hall was built in 1897 for the Enger family, whose fortune followed Cincinnati's turn from carriage-making to the automobile — Frank Enger went on to found the Enger Motor Car Company.
Architect Matthew H. Burton gave the house a Beaux-Arts character, sometimes called palazzo for its three-part façade: limestone at the base, narrow Italian brick above, and a terra-cotta frieze at the roofline. The Engers hired fine craftsmen, and it still shows.
Chapter II
The Carriage House
Behind the mansion stands the carriage house, whose original stables once sheltered the family's horses and carriages.
Today those stables are two private residences — the Loft and the Studio. The original brick walls and tall ceilings remain, now with modern kitchens and baths.
Chapter III
The Xavier Years
In the twentieth century the estate passed to Xavier University and took the name it carries today: Marion Hall. For years it served as student housing, filling the old rooms with a very different kind of life before the university's chapter here came to a close.
Chapter IV
Restored with Care
By the 2010s the house had fallen into disrepair — overgrown, with a collapsed porch and asbestos to remove. In 2016, Ryan Messer and Jimmy Musuraca-Messer bought the estate and set about bringing it back as a family home.
Their restoration respected what the Engers had built, preserving the mansion's architecture and craftsmanship while making it livable for a new century. That work is theirs, and the estate owes them a great deal.
Read about the restoration →Chapter V
Our Family's Chapter
Today Marion Hall is home to Matt and Heather and their family, who live in the main house and care for the estate themselves.
We share it with guests in three private residences — the Mansion Suite and the two Carriage House homes — and with couples who spend their wedding morning here, arranged separately. A house this remarkable deserves to be enjoyed, and our hope is simple: that you'll make a memory or two of your own here.
We'd be glad to welcome you.