Bradford Golf Club

The Bradford Golf Club – known to everyone locally as Hawksworth – sits on high moorland ground at Guiseley, roughly midway between Leeds and Bradford and a short walk from Guiseley station on the Wharfedale line. The views across the valley towards Baildon and Rombalds Moor are a large part of its appeal.

The club was founded in 1891 and originally played on Baildon Moor, where Old Tom Morris had a hand in extending the course to eighteen holes. It moved to Hawksworth in 1899. In 1919 the committee turned down proposals from both Harry Colt and Alister MacKenzie, and instead brought in W. Herbert Fowler, working with Tom Simpson, whose comprehensive redesign was finished in 1923. That layout is essentially the course played today, a par 71 of 6,303 yards on firm, fast-running turf.

Two natural knolls, Birkin Hill and Greenhouse Hill, give the course its shape. The short 14th, played to a green cut into the face of Birkin Hill, is widely reckoned the best hole on the property. The club runs banded junior membership with weekly coaching and stages its own Junior Open.