Ridgewood Country Club
Designed by A. W. Tillinghast
History
The story of Ridgewood begins not with one course but with three, all born from a single ambitious commission handed to A. W. Tillinghast in the late 1920s. The membership, flush with the confidence of the era before the crash, wanted something grander than the typical eighteen — they wanted a facility that could rotate championship-caliber golf across a full complement of holes, and they had the land in Paramus to attempt it. Tillinghast answered with twenty-seven holes, organized into three nines, completed in 1929 just as the country’s economic fortunes were about to turn.
Tillinghast was at the height of his powers when he took on Ridgewood, having already shaped Winged Foot and Baltusrol into the vocabulary of American golf architecture. What he brought to this commission was his belief in variety — that a club with the resources to build three nines shouldn’t simply repeat itself three times over, but should give each nine its own identity while sharing a common architectural hand. The result was a rare American example of a triumvirate design, built not as an afterthought expansion but as a unified vision from the start.
Ridgewood’s stature grew through the decades that followed its opening. The club hosted the 1935 Ryder Cup, a marker of how quickly the young course had entered the game’s upper tier, and later the 1990 U.S. Senior Open, bringing championship golf back to Tillinghast’s routing more than sixty years after it opened. The three nines have been shuffled in configuration for various events over the years, a flexibility built into the original design, and the club has maintained its Tillinghast character through careful stewardship rather than reinvention — a rarity for a course of its age and pedigree.
Playing Notes
With 27 holes to choose from, your day starts with a decision: ask the pro shop which nine is playing firmest and fastest, since Ridgewood's routing gives you three distinct 9-hole personalities rather than one fixed 18. Expect rolling, sometimes significant elevation changes that make flat lies a rare commodity, so club selection on approach shots matters more here than distance off the tee. The terrain is walkable but will test your legs by the back nine of whichever combination you choose, and carts are readily available if you'd rather save your energy for shot-making. Tree-lined corridors keep the course feeling tighter than the yardage suggests, putting a premium on keeping the ball in play off the tee rather than swinging for maximum distance. Greens tend to have subtle breaks that are easy to misread from long range, so bring your best lag-putting instincts and don't be surprised if a putt that looks straight rolls off at the last few feet. Pack for variable wind exposure on the more open holes, and give yourself extra time on the practice green beforehand — reading these surfaces on the fly is one of the bigger challenges you'll face.