In the reign of Charles II, John Carey held the office of Riding Forester of the New Forest, with an old house and nine acres of land at Brockenhurst. His name has outlasted the house. Careys Manor Hotel & SenSpa is a red brick Arts and Crafts house of 1888 in Brockenhurst, a hotel since 1934, and a wedding there moves through the building’s later chapters: vows in the beamed Lounge of the Victorian house, a wedding breakfast in the Manor Suite added a century after it, and a Thai spa of 2004 for the morning after.
A riding forester and a Cornish marriage
Charles II gave the manor at Brockenhurst to John Carey for services rendered between 1660 and 1685. The house he knew, later called Brockenhurst Lodge, stood about 100 yards from the present building, on land that now belongs to Brockenhurst College. Mrs Bowden-Smith, who knew it before it came down, remembered a comfortable old house of perhaps 250 years, with a hiding place in the floor of one attic large enough to conceal a man.
The family name itself came from a marriage. Robert Smith, a wine merchant, married Miss Bowden of Cornwall, and the Bowden-Smiths owned the estate from 1790. When the head of the family died in 1886 the old lodge was pulled down, and the Reverend Hermann Bowden-Smith built a new house on a fresh site, completed in 1888. It stood in about 14 acres, with its own tennis court and the village cricket pitch. Hermann also built a row of houses in Brockenhurst, still known as Careys Cottages, and gave them to the village to be let to the poor, with retired estate staff first in line.
The New Forest National Park Authority, in its appraisal of the Waters Green and Black Knowl conservation area, picks out Careys Manor as an imposing building in the Arts and Crafts style and notes the impressive mature trees in its grounds. The house has a round corner tower, half timbered gables and tall brick chimneys, and a gravel drive runs up to its front door.
A hotel since 1934
Hermann Bowden-Smith was the last of his family to own the house. He sold it in 1934 before moving to Switzerland, and a Dutchman, Mr Builderbeck, opened it as a hotel, with most of the land sold separately to the local council.
The war gave it a different set of guests. The hotel housed the 2nd Battalion Welsh Guards, and in 1943 a Canadian headquarters contingent moved in. That December the Canadians gave a children’s Christmas party at the house, where some of the village children tasted ice cream and peanut butter for the first time. In early 1944 the woods around Brockenhurst became a secret training area for troops preparing for Normandy, their ancient oaks used to hide military vehicles, and the 50th (Northumbrian) Infantry Division, which was to storm Gold Beach on D-Day, had its headquarters at the Carey’s Manor Hotel.
John Ferris bought the hotel in 1957 and added the garden wings in 1966 and 1967. The Leach family, owners from 1975, added the East Garden Wing in 1987 and the Manor Suite in 1988. In 2004 the old health club became SenSpa, a Thai spa, after a £6 million overhaul. Myst Hotels & Resorts bought the hotel in 2025.
Vows beneath the beams or in a walled garden
Careys Manor holds one wedding a day, and the ceremony and the reception take place in different rooms, so nobody waits while a room is reset between the vows and the meal.
In the main house, the Lounge has a high wood panelled ceiling crossed with oak beams and a large inglenook fireplace, and it seats 60 for a civil ceremony. The Cedar Suite is the lighter choice, with large windows, its own private entrance and French doors onto a private terrace; it can take the ceremony, the wedding breakfast or the evening party. Booked with the Cedar Suite, the Cedar Garden is a walled English garden with a handmade oak pavilion for marrying outdoors, and later in the day the same garden holds drinks or a relaxed barbecue. A secret garden is kept for the couple and their photographer.
The couple’s dog is welcome to take part in the day, and the wedding team arranges how. Francoise Gysemans, the wedding coordinator, has 16 years of experience, shows couples round in person and keeps a list of suppliers she has chosen herself, from venue stylists to vintage car hire.
A wedding breakfast in the Manor Suite
The Manor Suite is the larger of the two dining rooms, seating up to 100 for the wedding breakfast beneath its chandeliers. Its French windows open onto a private south facing courtyard garden, where guests can take their drinks round the fountain. For a smaller party the Cedar Suite seats up to 80.
Catering is in house. The hotel advises serving the wedding breakfast no later than 3.30pm, which leaves time for the journey from church where there is one, a drinks reception, group photographs and a receiving line, and still leaves enough time for the evening reception.
Couples can tailor every element or start from a package. The Complete Celebration covers room hire for the ceremony, the wedding breakfast and the evening, a tasting for the couple beforehand, canapés, a three course meal chosen from the wedding breakfast, barbecue or afternoon tea menus, half a bottle of house wine for each guest, a resident DJ for the evening and use of the walled garden with the Cedar Suite. The couple spend the night in the Four Poster Manor Suite, with a four poster bed and a bay window, use SenSpa the next morning and return for a night on their first anniversary.
The other packages change the scale or the season. Love in a Bubble is for a small wedding of close family and friends, Love at Frost Sight is the winter package, Graze and Green is styled with foliage hoops and natural wood tables, and the Platinum Celebration stretches the wedding over three days with spa treatments and country pursuits.
Staying for the weekend
The hotel has 77 bedrooms, and a number of them are available for wedding guests to book. Manor Rooms in the manor house have king size or four poster beds; Garden Rooms in the garden wing are more contemporary, with a terrace or balcony over the gardens. The Rosewood Suite, Thai in style, sits in the garden wing close to the spa. For a family party, Pittefaux Cottage stands in the hotel grounds with three bedrooms for up to seven, two gardens of its own and a long oak table that seats eight.
Three restaurants make the days either side of the wedding easy to fill: Cambium for modern British cooking, Zen Garden for Thai food inside SenSpa, and KASI, the newest, for Indian dishes. The spa itself has a hydrotherapy pool with underwater benches and jets at different heights, a 14 metre pool overlooking the Zen Garden, two double treatment rooms, and four thermal rooms, among them a crystal steam room with a large amethyst crystal and a tepidarium with heated mosaic loungers. The spa and pools are open to guests aged 16 and over.
Ponies, the Waterloo line and the Isle of Wight ferry
William the Conqueror made the New Forest a royal hunting ground around 1079, and it became a National Park on 1 March 2005. Commoners’ ponies still graze unfenced across the open forest, roam through Brockenhurst itself and have right of way on the Forest’s roads, so guests arriving by car are likely to meet some before they reach the drive.
From London the train is straightforward. Brockenhurst station is about half a mile from the hotel, with South Western Railway services to London Waterloo in about 90 minutes and to Southampton, Bournemouth and Weymouth. The Lymington branch line joins the main line here, and its trains meet the ferry to Yarmouth on the Isle of Wight. By road, the New Forest is about 85 miles from London, Southampton 13 miles to the north east and Bournemouth 15 miles to the south west, and parking at the hotel is free for guests.
The Lounge or the walled garden
Careys Manor suits a wedding of up to 100 at dinner that wants everything in one place: the ceremony, the meal, the evening, the guests’ rooms and the spa, a short walk from a main line station. The question to settle on a first visit is where to marry. The Lounge keeps the ceremony inside the Bowden-Smiths’ house, beneath its beams and beside the inglenook, whatever the weather; the oak pavilion in the walled Cedar Garden, booked with the Cedar Suite, takes it outdoors.
Check your date with Careys Manor Hotel & SenSpa, or explore more wedding venues in Hampshire.
