Toronto Golf Club

The Toronto Golf Club was founded in 1876, which makes it the third-oldest golf club in North America. It has moved several times; the present site on the Etobicoke Creek in Mississauga was laid out by Harry Colt, who came from England to do the work, and the course was ready for play in the autumn of 1912, with the clubhouse finished the following year.

It was Colt’s first course in North America and Canada’s first championship course, and it staged three Canadian Opens between 1914 and 1927. In recent years the club has removed more than two thousand trees to open the vistas and restore the sight lines Colt had.

What it asks of you

A par 70 in the English manner rather than the North American one: no great length, and a tight, intelligent routing along and across a creek valley with high ridges standing over low ground.

The middle stretch is what people come for. The course begins quietly, starts to build from the fourth, and the holes running up and down the hillside through the middle of the round are described by architecture writers as about as good as inland golf gets.

The set of short holes is the other distinguishing feature, and it is a sophisticated one: no two ask the same question, and none of them relies on length. Colt let the contours dictate the design rather than imposing anything on the site.

What players say about it

Guests play by member introduction, so the public record comes from guest accounts and architecture writing. The notes below summarise recurring themes across those public sources. They are other people’s opinions, not ours: we have not played the course, and we do not name or quote individual reviewers.

What comes up in its favour

• The middle stretch of holes draws the strongest praise, and more than one writer calls it the best run of inland golf in the country.
• The par threes are singled out as an unusually good and varied set.
• Conditioning is consistently well rated, and the tree removal programme is credited with restoring both the views and the strategy.
• It is a walking club and reviewers value that: a creek valley round with foxes and birds, in the middle of a suburb.

What comes up against

• Access is closed and the club is genuinely private. Almost nobody will play it without a member.
• The opening holes are the quietest part of the round, and the course takes several holes to show what it is.
• At a par of 70 without great length, it will not satisfy a player who measures a course by its yardage.
• The review record is thin, and any summary of it, including this one, rests on a small number of accounts.

Getting there and when to go

The club is on Dixie Road in Mississauga, around twenty-five minutes west of downtown Toronto and fifteen from Pearson.

The season runs from roughly April to November, with late spring and September the best of it. Guest play is arranged through a member.

Green fees

Guest conditions and rates are set by the club and are not published. See the club’s own site.

How this page was made

The factual frame comes from public sources: OpenStreetMap for the location, Wikipedia and published architecture and championship coverage for the history, the Colt design and the restoration, and the club’s own site for access. The opinion section summarises public commentary and guest accounts read in September 2026; we report recurring themes rather than individual voices, and we do not reproduce or attribute quotes.

We have not played this course, and nothing here is a substitute for that. The club has not paid for this page, has not seen it before publication and has no say in what it says. If you know the course and something here is wrong or out of date, write to us and we will correct it.