Newest golf course in Washington offers fascinating and scenic take on playability

USA Today

25-07-2025

What does playability mean for golf architects? For David McLay Kidd, the concept largely focuses on having room to miss a shot, then possibly recover, or at the very least keep swinging. What it does not mean is that a course is too easy for good players to make too many birdies.
The theory will be on full display starting August 1 when the new Scarecrow course opens at Gamble Sands in Brewster, Washington. The first course at the resort – the eponymous Gamble Sands 18-hole layout that opened in 2014 with long views of the Columbia River – helped redefine playability in modern architecture and marked Kidd's new focus on playability for all levels of golfers. That course is ranked by Golfweek's Best as the No. 2 layout in the state of Washington and No. 24 among all public-access courses in the U.S., and it ties for No. 53 among all modern courses in the U.S.
Scarecrow, with the Scottish Kidd overseeing development but designed largely by Kidd's longtime partner Nick Schaan, will be a new look at the team's focus on playability. While the original 18 offers extremely wide fairways and plenty of favorable bounces that might kick a ball down and closer to the hole, Scarecrow has a bit more teeth. The greens are set closer to the edges of canyons, and there are a few more pinched points that force players to make decisions. There is still plenty of room to miss, but not always on all sides of the fairways and greens, as seen at the original course.
In short, Scarecrow offers a new take by Kidd and Schaan on the boundaries of playability, as defined by Kidd.
'What does playable mean? It means a place to miss,' Kidd told Golfweek while the course was still growing in. 'It means the ability to have some chance of recovery. It means a wide-enough fairway that you can get the ball in play, even if it's not on the aggressive scoring line. I can give it plenty of additional width for misses around the green so that you can make bogey with relative ease. But you can't make birdie with impunity. It takes real effort to make a birdie.'
It all should make for a fascinating opportunity to compare and contrast two takes on playability. Which will be the favorite layout on property? Only time will tell, and the best guess is that there will be plenty of discussions about which course is best. That's a great thing for Kidd, Schaan, the resort operators and the players eager to see the new Scarecrow.