Bighorn Country Club

The Desert Oasis Insider field guide · Palm Desert, California

Bighorn is a study in contrasts: sculptural homes against raw desert rock, emerald golf corridors below rugged ridgelines, and a private club campus built around far more than the next round.

Known officially as BIGHORN Golf Club, this South Palm Desert community brings two championship courses together with contemporary architecture, dining, wellness and an unusually wide collection of member services. Explore its setting through twelve daytime aerial photographs by Mark Miller and an AI-altered evening interpretation, then use the practical directory below to understand how the pieces fit together.

The setting: where the city meets the mountains

The first thing these aerial views reveal is how much the terrain determines the experience. Fairways trace corridors through the foothills. Homes occupy pockets between rock slopes, greens and winding roads. In places, a broad view across the neighborhood gives way almost immediately to a close wall of desert mountain.

Bighorn sits along Highway 74 above central Palm Desert. El Paseo’s shops, galleries and restaurants and the McCallum Theatre are nearby city destinations. The club promotes its proximity to them; actual travel time depends on the gate, destination, traffic and season. The photographs show why this address feels connected to the desert landscape even while the city remains within reach.

Location reference: Bighorn’s location overview.

Two courses. Two design signatures.

The Mountains course, designed by Arthur Hills, and the Canyons course, designed by Tom Fazio, are Bighorn’s central golf pairing. Each has eighteen holes and its own relationship to the desert terrain. The club’s public course pages provide hole-by-hole pars and distances across multiple tees—a more useful starting point than a single back-tee yardage.

Bighorn’s tournament story includes the Battles at Bighorn, Skins Games and LPGA Samsung World Championships. Its member golf offering also includes practice facilities, a Golf Learning Center and instruction. Ask the golf staff about the current practice setup, coaching, guest play and seasonal course schedule when arranging a visit.

Golf references: official golf overview and the individual course guides above.

The clubhouse as architecture

Bighorn’s clubhouse is instantly recognizable from above. Its sweeping roof forms, glass walls and layered terraces create a strong contemporary silhouette, softened by palms, stone and water. The building overlooks the Mountains course’s eighteenth green, with the lake and rocky landscape extending the composition beyond its walls.

The club describes an approximately 80,000-square-foot building including the clubhouse and four custom penthouse residences. That distinction matters: the entire figure is not member amenity space. Guy Dreier is credited with the penthouse floor plans and the interiors of residences 301 and 303.

The social spaces include The Pour House, private dining, locker-room lounges, card rooms, a boardroom, The Hub and the Event Terrace. Their range helps explain the building’s role: it serves meetings, meals and gatherings as well as golf. In the photographs, the contrast between its broad roof and the much smaller surrounding homes makes its scale especially clear.

Architecture and facilities: Bighorn’s clubhouse overview.

Dining, from coffee to an evening out

The official dining overview describes nine indoor and outdoor venues across the campus. The selection ranges from casual stops to a more formal dinner, with takeout and campus delivery also advertised.

Private dining, the locker-room venues, The Hub and the Event Terrace complete the published lineup. For a specific meal or occasion, confirm current opening days, reservations, guest privileges, dress expectations and menus directly. These are private club venues; this page is not a public restaurant booking service.

Explore the official dining directory.

Wellness, swimming and court sports

A closer aerial perspective reveals a compact active campus near the clubhouse: courts, the lap pool, landscaping and paths sit together rather than disappearing into the larger golf landscape.

The amenities beyond the fairways

Homes in the landscape

These photographs are particularly useful for understanding the community’s visual language. Long rooflines, generous glass, outdoor terraces, pools and warm stone sit against a much rougher background. Some homes face open golf corridors; others nestle into the hillside. A single wide view can show several very different approaches to living with the same terrain.

Look at the edges of each property: where a terrace meets native rock, how a pool follows the house, and where trees soften the transition to a neighboring fairway. This is the architectural context of Bighorn. For individual homes, floor plans, privacy, condition and market evidence, use the separate study guide and a property visit.

A short history of the vision

The club traces its early development to Westinghouse. In 1996, R.D. Hubbard and a group of member investors purchased the land and development rights, a pivotal step in the community’s evolution. The Canyons course opened in December 1998. Televised Battles at Bighorn later brought the setting to a much larger audience.

The continuing story is visible in the campus itself: golf, architecture, gathering places and specialist amenities have accumulated into a distinctive club identity. The June 2026 photographs also capture work in progress near the clubhouse—a reminder that a club landscape changes over time.

Read Bighorn’s own account of its history.

Membership: the published starting point

Checked November 8, 2026, Bighorn’s official membership page lists these initiation fees:

These are alternative membership categories. The public page states that residency requirements apply and advertises member golf without tee times. It describes Club Membership as a non-equity, non-voting, non-refundable, non-transferable license; Golf Membership as non-proprietary, non-voting and non-transferable.

The figures above are initiation fees, not the total annual cost. Current dues, assessments, guest charges and service fees require a direct quote. Membership documents govern eligibility and privileges. Contact the membership office at 760-834-7280 or dhunton@bighorngolf.com.

Official membership information and current terms.

Plan an informed visit

Bighorn is a private community. Arrange access in advance through the club, a host or an authorized property appointment. A map pin does not provide admission to the grounds, restaurants or golf courses.

Questions people ask

The final perspective

From above, Bighorn’s identity becomes easy to read: fairways frame the homes, architecture gives the club a recognizable center, and the mountains remain the largest presence in the scene. The photographs offer a way to explore that relationship before seeing it at ground level.