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Summary

Description

1898 with later additions. Single storey, square-plan, purpose-built, golf club house with later alterations and extensions to rear to form larger square plan. Low swept overhanging roof forming veranda under bracketed eaves punctuated by 2 stone gabletted dormers with 4 mullioned windows to W elevation overlooking putting green, and a single stone dormer with bipartite window off-sett to the N elevation. Sandstone ashlar with red stone quoins and window margins to N and W elevations, painted render to rear.

Separate rectangular-plan, piended roofed pro shop linked to NE corner by spanning roof section. Separate rendered flat roofed boiler block to SE with panelled doors and window hatch covers.

Timber sash and case windows with predominantly 4 over one glazing pattern. Graded grey slate roofs with squat, corniced stone ridge stack and corniced and rendered double shouldered wallhead stacks. Decorative iron finial.

INTERIOR: contemporary decorative scheme elements surviving to interior. Boarded entrance hall and panelled timber gentlemen's lounge lined with numbered players lockers in their original positions, combed and boarded ceiling with decorative cast iron ventilator covers and brick detail fireplace with honours board above.

Statement of Special Interest

Kilspindie Golf Club is a good example of a later 19th century purpose-built golf club in East Lothian with an interesting plan form and plain form.

One of the few clubs founded in the mid 19th century. The club was founded 1867 as Luffness Golf Club on land nearer the dunes to the East. In 1894 the club split with half of the members moving to create a new club, Luffness New, near Gullane and the remainder accepting an offer of land gifted by the neighbouring Earl of Wemyss and March of Gosford House to build a new club on land bordering Craigielaw Farm. Subsequent to the split the half of the club that remained was renamed Kilspindie Golf Club 1899 as it was built on the Kilspindie plantation.

A photograph from the opening day of 26th November 1898 shows the newly built clubhouse was built as a smaller building with a veranda to at least three sides. At some point in the earlier 20th century the north elevation was extended to the east end and service and office space extensions were built to the rear. The original smaller clubhouse of 1867 apparently had land banked up to the south to hide it from the view of the landowner to the South.

The 'Articles and Laws in Playing Golf', a set of rules whose principles still underpin the game's current regulations, were penned in 1744 by the Company of Gentlemen Golfers (now The Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers). Improved transport links and increased leisure time as well as a rise in the middle classes from the mid 19th century onwards increased the popularity of the sport with another peak taking place in the early 1900s.

The sociable aspect of the game encouraged the building of distinctive clubhouses with bar and restaurant facilities. Purpose-built clubhouses date from the mid-nineteenth century onwards; previously clubs had used villas or rooms in an inn near to the course. Earlier clubhouses were typically enlarged in stages as the popularity of the game increased throughout the 19th and 20th century. The sport has grown further in popularity in recent years, especially overseas in places such as USA and Canada.

At the time of writing (2013), the governing body for amateur golf in Scotland, the Scottish Golf Union (SGU), reported around 550 golf courses in Scotland, representing a total membership of approximately 236,000 golf club members. Interestingly, 7 of the 14 venues where the Open Championship is held are in Scotland. Scotland has produced a number of famous golf sporting personalities ' historically, James Braid (1870-1950) and Old Tom Morris (1821-1908) were the pioneers of their time.

Listed as part of the sporting buildings thematic study (2012-13).

References

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