Laramie Plains Museum Opens for 2026 Season, Now Booking Special Events

The Laramie Plains Museum has reopened at 603 Ivinson Avenue following its annual winter closure, with staff now accepting reservations for weddings, receptions, conferences, and community gatherings at the historic Ivinson Mansion and its accompanying Alice Hardie Stevens Center.

Guided tours of the three-level, approximately 9,000-square-foot exhibition space run Tuesday through Saturday from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. Extended summer hours of 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. run Tuesday through Thursday, with Sunday afternoon tours added to the schedule as well. Each guided tour lasts approximately one hour and moves through collection themes spanning the American West, Victoriana, ranch history, and immigration, including artifacts such as a Chickering Piano from 1860 and a barn door from the Wooden Shoe Ranch bearing Albany County cattle brands painted by local cowboys.

The Alice Hardie Stevens Center, originally built as a gymnasium during the mansion's tenure as a girls' school, is available to rent for weddings, classes, parties, and community gatherings. The mansion itself and its grounds can be reserved for similar occasions. Event planners can reach the Carriage House office at (307) 742-4448 or lpmdirector@laramiemuseum.org for information on availability, room capacities, and rental fees.

The spring and summer event calendar is already taking shape. April brings a Volunteer Appreciation event, followed by the Tea on Tuesday series running through May, June, and July, with each session featuring treats and a historical talk by museum staff. Art Fest on the Lawn, an outdoor craft fair, is held on the last Sunday of Jubilee Days in July. The annual Evening at the Ivinsons' fundraiser follows in August with silent and live auctions, entertainment, and free mansion tours.

The museum occupies an 11,726-square-foot Victorian Queen Anne-style building constructed between 1892 and 1893 at a cost of $40,000. Designed by Salt Lake City architect Walter E. Ware and built by local contractor Frank Cook, the mansion was the most significant private residence in Laramie at its completion, equipped with central heating, electric lights, and running water. Edward Ivinson, a businessman born in the Virgin Islands in 1830 who arrived in Laramie City in 1868, commissioned the home for himself and his English-born wife, Jane Wood Ivinson. In 1921, Edward donated the property to the Episcopal Missionary District of Wyoming, which operated it as a school for girls until 1958. The building sat vacant until the Laramie Plains Museum Association purchased it in 1972, the same year the federal government listed it on the National Register of Historic Places.

The LPMA's roots stretch back to 1898, just eight years after Wyoming statehood, when Mary Godat Bellamy, the first woman representative to a government legislature in Wyoming, led a group of women in collecting the artifacts that anchor the present-day collection. The Laramie Women's Club and Albany County Historical Society formally incorporated the organization in 1966, then played a decisive role in 1969 when the Episcopal Diocese began negotiating to sell the Ivinson property, with condominiums and a parking lot among the options under discussion. The LPMA's intervention preserved both the building and its collection; the museum has occupied the mansion since 1973.

The museum also runs a Junior Docent program through which young students give guided tours, assist curators on projects, and help maintain the grounds, a volunteer pipeline the museum calls central to sustaining its extended summer hours as a nonprofit organization.

Full schedule details, exhibit information, and booking forms are available at laramiemuseum.org or by calling (307) 742-4448.