Emerald Dunes Club

Emerald Dunes opened in 1990 as a Tom Fazio design on former quarry land west of West Palm Beach, where crushed-coral-rock excavation had left a large mound. Rather than level it, Fazio kept it as the course's signature 'Super Dune,' dressing the elevations with rock outcroppings and waterfalls that are a rarity in flat South Florida. The layout was hailed almost immediately as one of the best in the state and reached national top-100 lists, opening first as a daily-fee course before evolving into a private club. In 2011 Fazio returned for an extensive master-plan renovation, reported at roughly $15 million: new championship tees, widened fairways, rebuilt and reshaped greens, more than 100 bunkers, and two reconfigured holes, plus thousands of mature palms planted around the perimeter to screen the outside world and heighten the sense of seclusion.