Franklin Hills Country Club

Franklin Hills Country Club occupies a compact, rolling property in Franklin, northwest of Detroit. The club is private, with golf at its core: an 18-hole Donald Ross course that, from the longest tees, plays to roughly 6,923 yards at par 71. The present-day campus includes a practice range (with an indoor, year-round training center built beneath the range tee), short-game areas, and tennis, aquatics, and dining centered on an English Tudor-style clubhouse designed in the late 1920s by Detroit architect Albert Kahn. Golfers encounter a classic parkland setting with tree-lined corridors, modest elevation changes, and a sequence that tightens and releases in rhythm rather than with brute length. Two features define the modern experience: the drivable but perilous 13th, whose tiny “volcano” green perches roughly 30 feet above the fairway, and a set of firm, contoured putting surfaces that place a premium on approach control and short-game nerve. The club hosts elite state competitions, most recently the 100th Golf Association of Michigan (GAM) Championship, and continues to invest in both facilities and agronomy through a rolling master-planning process.