The 79,000-sq. ft. facility at the Palm Desert, Calif., property was unveiled to members at a ribbon-cutting on November 6. The clubhouse includes six indoor/outdoor dining areas, expansive locker rooms, a boardroom complete with video conferencing abilities, a jewelry shop in the pro shop, and four penthouses on the top floor.
The owners and members at Bighorn Golf Club in Palm Desert, Calif., are banking on long-term results from their opulent new clubhouse that opened for the 36-hole facility on November 6, the Palm Springs, Calif., Desert Sun reported.
The 79,000-sq. ft. clubhouse, built in 16 months including the tear down of the old clubhouse, is a central piece in securing what founding partner R.D. Hubbard hopes will be a long future for his club, the Sun reported.
C&RB reported on plans for the facility in January.
“In all honesty, my legacy, which assures Bighorn is going to be here and be successful for the foreseeable future, that’s what was important for me,” said Hubbard, the head of the investment group that bought Bighorn 21 years ago.
The club needs new members each year to replace those who leave for various reasons, but Hubbard says he doesn’t want to just maintain Bighorn’s membership rolls at the current 510, but expand to a maximum of 550 by the end of the year. The new clubhouse is part of that plan, the Sun reported.
“Since we announced the new clubhouse (at the start of 2016), and we just had a (rendering) and the like, we have sold 56 membership in that time,” Hubbard said. “Absolutely it has paid off. But I anticipate this year, this golf season will be by far the biggest payoff for new members. We’ve got so many prospects who are waiting to see what it is going to be.”
The reaction of members Monday was positive both in terms of the building, estimated at $70 million when construction began, and what it means for the future of Bighorn, the Sun reported.
“This was R.D.’s vision, and he put together a great team and pulled it off,” said James Gagan, one of the original investors in the group led by Hubbard that bought Bighorn in 1996. “When people see this clubhouse, what it offers, everyone will want to be a member—if they can afford it.”
Jim Colbert, former PGA Tour and PGA Tour Champions winner and also part of the investment group, has owned or managed dozens of courses through the years. “Of all the clubhouses I’ve seen, and I’ve see quite a few, this is the most functional clubhouse I have ever seen,” said Colbert, standing on the back balcony of the clubhouse overlooking the 18th hole of the Mountain Course.
More than 300 members and guests attended the ribbon cutting on the new clubhouse and saw what Bighorn’s money and a membership assessment have produced. The clubhouse, just south of the 18th hole on the Mountain Course, includes six indoor/outdoor dining areas, expansive locker rooms for men and women with lockers that open with a touch pad rather than a key, a boardroom complete with video conferencing abilities, and a jewelry shop in the pro shop, the Sun reported.
The clubhouse features structures that rise to points both in the front and the back of the building. The top floor consists of four penthouses, each a custom residence ranging from 5,129 to 6,790 sq. ft. One of the penthouses has already been sold, the Sun reported.
Hubbard’s favorite feature of the clubhouse is when a car pulls up in front of the building, the Sun reported.
“When you drive up in front, you look through the glass doors and you see all the way through and you see the mountains down there at the end (at the north edge of the valley), and whether it’s morning, noon or night, that mountain down there changes from time to time,” Hubbard said. “And it really truly is a painted picture you are seeing. I think that helps with our members because that’s what they are looking at and maybe they miss a little thing or two, but they are happy.
“I said we don’t need a new clubhouse, but they got me thinking and I started walking around our old clubhouse and I found rooms that we had shut down and just had stuff stored, just different things,” Hubbard said. “And I realized that it was 20 years old and we talked about remodeling and we said you can’t remodel something that is 20-25 years old. If you are going to do something, we need a whole new clubhouse.”
If the clubhouse serves it function, Hubbard believes it will be used for years. “This clubhouse has got to be timeless. It has to be something that will stand for another 25 years, and that’s what we’ve got here,” he said.
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