1 2 The grand tudor manor was the crowning achievement for Capilano Golf & Country Club when it opened in 1938 and maintains that regal presence today.

Just as Stanley Thompson's brilliant course design has stood the test of time, so too has the clubhouse, reflecting the careful stewardship of the membership.

Offering spectacular views of Downtown Vancouver to the south, Mt. Baker to the southeast and mountain vistas to the north, the clubhouse figures prominently in Capilano lore. Three days after Christmas in 1938, at a meeting to negotiate terms of establishing the private club, it was agreed by both the British Pacific Properties Company and club management that the unfinished clubhouse was crucial to the success of attracting new members. The company agreed to finish and furnish the under construction clubhouse as soon as new club management could show proof of 100 signed up members. With club pro Jock McKinnon and the breathtaking scenery doing the selling, that proved not a problem, and true to their word, British Pacific Properties ordered fine furnishings from England and hired the Vancouver architectural firm McCarter and Nairne to redesign certain aspects of the interior and oversee final clubhouse construction.

"It was a beautiful building," recalled John McCarter, "but it had a very cluttered and badly arranged floor plan, all cut up into little sections with the wrong rooms opening up the wrong views. On the lower floor the marvelous view of the water and the city down the first fairway could be seen only from the window in the men's lavatory."

Opening the 'manor house'

McCarter and his staff set about changing that fact and many others, reconfiguring the original design to take advantage of the spectacular view and to clean up some interior flaws. When construction was complete, the furnishings were in transit on a slow boat from England via the Panama Canal. They finally arrived, and on May 17, 1939 the Capilano clubhouse was officially opened with a lavish reception, marking the official opening not only of the 'manor house,' but also the official establishment of Capilano Golf & Country Club itself.
Although the original master plan had called for a huge recreation complex that would also include a swimming pool, tennis courts, and a polo field complete with adjoining stables, the threat of war and the general world concern about the future had changed all that. These elaborate plans were put aside and then, after the war, discarded.

Expansions and updates

The very first addition to the clubhouse came in 1947, with the creation of a private dining room (the Capilano Room), a new vestibule, and administrative offices on the main floor. When Capilano members purchased the club property in 1955 from the British Pacific Properties Company, one of their first orders of business was to update and expand the clubhouse.

The first move proved a good decision, as a kitchen expansion in 1956 improved the demand for dining and led in 1959 and 1961 to expanding and converting the members' lounge and adjoining rooms into a formal dining-room to take advantage of the stunning views of the south-east side of the clubhouse. As a result, the elegant Stanley Thompson Room gained a reputation as one of the best places for dinner in West Vancouver. In fact, at the time it was one of just a handful of formal dining-rooms on the entire North Shore.

In 1958-59, a major addition relocated the men's locker-room to the north end and the men’s card room lounge to the south end, following which another movement for change suggested not only a restructuring of the clubhouse, but also a major reworking of the golf course. It all started with the temporary relocation of the golf shop from the south end of the clubhouse to the north end under the 19th hole. Some on the board of directors circulated the idea of making the move permanent, which didn’t make much sense as the location, albeit breathtakingly scenic, was on the far side of the 1st tee, making the golf shop’s job of setting golfers off a difficult one.

That’s when things got interesting. A proposal was generated to re-assign the hole numbers, with 17 becoming the opening hole, and 16 the closing hole. In addition, an elevated green fronted by a large lake would turn 16, or the new 18, into a stunning home hole. The whole idea was eventually put to rest by the board of the day when it was decided a new and separate golf shop would be built to the south of the clubhouse. This allowed the ladies’ locker-room to be moved to the lower floor to take over the vacated area of the old golf shop.

In 1961, a new separate building housing the present golf shop was built. Before then, the 1st tee was on the present putting green next to the Southern Catalpa tree, but on Jock McKinnon’s insistence that the new golf shop have a clear view of the 1st tee in order to control the flow of the starting hole, the tee box was moved to its current location. With an eye to its ever- expanding wedding reception business, the club enlarged the dining-room on the northeast corner of the main floor in 1980 to complement the Stanley Thompson Room. With a nod to Capilano’s British connection, the diningroom was named the Guinness Room.