Lake Merced Golf Club

About the club

Lake Merced is one of the latest clubs to benefit from the restoration work of Gil Hanse, Jim Wagner and their team. In 1962, a freeway consumed a portion of the club’s property and forced a major overhaul of the work Alister MacKenzie did in 1929 and 1930, forcing the holes to be re-routed, new holes to be built and permanently altering the look and character of the golf course. Gone were the deep barrancas, sandy waste areas and MacKenzie's signature mounding and bunker designs. The new course was reflective of the design predilections of the post-World War II era that included tree plantings, simplified bunkers and a general narrowing of the holes. Further work done in the 1990s, including new bunkers and elevated greens, enhanced the modern aspects of the course, even as the cypress and pines had overgrown most hole corridors. Hanse and Wager suggested the club attempt to recapture the MacKenzie routing, and they were able to recreate 14½ original holes, two and ½ hybrid holes and the new par-3 16th playing next to one of MacKenzie’s marquee holes, the revived par-3 13th. In all, 150,000 square feet of bunkers were refurbished in a style that matches the club’s 1920s shaping, trees were pared back and eliminated and a new spacious practice facility was added to the north side of the property. The changes were strong enough to earn Lake Merced the Golf Digest Best Transformation award for 2023.