Welcome to the Middle East’s newest clubhouse, an elegant accompaniment to the fine golf on offer at Dubai Hills Golf Club
By Kent Gray
For golfers the world over, a duck hook is a disheartening scourge to scorecard happiness. In Dubai, The Duck Hook is something altogether more appealing.
The Emirate’s newest golf course opened to great fanfare and rave reviews late last month and it wasn’t just the eminently playable and immaculately presented European Golf Design layout that warranted those worthy plaudits.
The 45,000sq foot, Arabian-themed clubhouse at Dubai Hills Golf Club is an elegant accompaniment to a course sure to attract global attention, especially with the iconic Burj Khalifa serving as an almost constant backdrop.
A gentle fade to the right through the lobby at Dubai Hills G.C. is the aforementioned The Duck Hook, a British-inspired bar complete with views beyond the 18th green and six big screens on the walls to watch the latest golf or big game after your round.
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Legend has it the name is the work of the restaurant operator’s marketing team lead by Niki Walsh, who wanted an esoteric golfing term that would also have a wider, playful appeal for non-golfers too. JRG have taken the name and run with it, going to town with the quacky theme in a space tastefully adorned with duck paraphernalia at every turn, even the artwork on the walls. You’ll certainly know where you are as you debrief your round, hopefully, minus any of those roped, right-to-left scorecard wreckers of your own.
Play a little draw through the lobby and you’ll happen upon Hillhouse Brasserie, an upmarket boulangerie by day and fashionable international brasserie by night with an open kitchen serving concept dining sure to tempt even the most discerning palate. Together they can serve 400 covers in eateries sure to be popular with members and visitors alike.
Elsewhere, the clubhouse offers everything Middle East golfers have come to expect from a five-star golf facility, achieved with contemporary sophistication but thankfully minus much of the over-the-top opulence of neighbouring clubs.
Golfers will drive beneath the clubhouse to find the bag drop before parking and entering the clubhouse through the upstairs lobby for check-in and directions to the locker rooms. Inside you’ll find the usual amenities including a sauna and steam room, the latter perhaps to ease any aches and pains after a session in the members’ only gym next door, kitted out with the latest, touch-screen TechnoGym equipment which can track your progress and build a profile to ensure you get in even better golf shape.
On the way out to the buggy drop, there is a fully-stocked Golf Shop offering the latest Ping rental clubs for visitors. A nice touch in the new golf carts is a USB port to charge your inevitably flat rangefinder or cellphone – you’ll want plenty of battery to snapshots of all the memorable holes you’re about to tackle.
A short drive from the clubhouse you’ll find The Golf Academy at Dubai Hills G.C. set to open in January. It will come complete with two, roller-doored, indoor teaching studios that open out onto the range, like the one at Troon Golf sister property Arabian Ranches Golf Club. Already in play are two fantastic short game areas, a driving range ring-fenced by a neat little par-3 course and arguably the biggest practice putting green in the Middle East – all 1780 square metres of it. Members should have no issue with their lag putting at Dubai Hills G.C., plus a ready escape from any blessed duck hooks in The Duck Hook.
