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In February 2020, right before the world shut down, my wife and I went to Rome for our honeymoon. It was the farthest I've ever traveled without my golf clubs, and I loved every minute of the trip.
The next time we visit, though, I might have to bring my sticks. Mi scusi, amore mio. After all, how many chances might I have to play a Ryder Cup host golf course?
That's how golf destinations are born. Or at least that's the idea behind awarding golf's foremost team competition to a country with fewer than 100,000 total golfers. For comparison's sake, the U.S. has more than 25 million golfers, with nearly 6 million across the British Isles.
This year will mark the second consecutive Ryder Cup hosted by Europe on the continent, following on the heels of the 2018 edition outside Paris at Le Golf National, which attracted some 270,000 spectators and whose estimated economic impact exceeded €235 million.
France is a somewhat more established golf country than Italy, but nevertheless it feels appropriate to bring golf's biggest biennial traveling circus to a site just a few miles from the ancient Colosseum, if for no other reason than to establish it as one of the many spectacles the Eternal City has welcomed over millennia, on top of a quietly solid foundation for the game.
No one really needs much more reason to want to visit Italy than its incredible food, wine, culture and scenery. But if Marco Simone Golf & Country Club proves an exciting venue for the 2023 Ryder Cup, it certainly adds another diversion to a country full of them.
Golf in Italy: history and players of note
Golf has been played in Italy for 120 years. The original Rome Golf Club (now the Golf Club of Rome Acquasanta) dates to 1903, while the Menaggio & Cadenabbia Golf Club, on Lake Como some 300 miles north, was founded in 1907.
The Italian Open, now a DP World Tour event whose 80th edition Adrian Meronk captured in May at Marco Simone, dates back to 1925. It was played every year through 1960, with the exception of 1933. Ever since it started up again in 1971, it has been a pillar of what is now the DP World Tour, having been played every year of that circuit's existence.
Six Italian men have won the Italian Open a combined eight times, with Francesco Molinari the last to do it, in 2016 at the Golf Club Milano. He also won the 2006 edition, at Castello Tolcinasco, also in Milan.
Molinari, currently the highest ranked Italian in the world, at #157, is the greatest player in the country's history, and its only professional major champion to date. The 40-year-old native of Turin has 10 professional wins, including the 2018 Open Championship at Carnoustie, capturing the Claret Jug that famously eluded countryman Costantino Rocca, who lost to John Daly in a playoff at St. Andrews in 1995. Molinari's older brother, Edoardo, won the 2005 U.S. Amateur at Merion Golf Club and has three DP World Tour wins to date.
On the women's side, the future is particularly bright for Italian golf. Virginia Elena Carta, who played collegiately at Duke University before turning pro, sits at #236 in the Rolex ranking, while Benedetta Moresco, who will enter her fourth year at the University of Alabama in the fall, took home Low Amateur honors at the 2023 U.S. Women's Open. Perhaps a future Italian golf star will cite the '23 Ryder Cup as an event that helped him or her fall in love with the game.
Notable golf courses and resorts of Italy
GolfPass recognizes 468 total courses throughout the country, with the largest concentrations of courses, naturally, sitting in the most populated regions. Golf is most plentiful in Northern Italy's Piedmont region, with 72 courses.
While Marco Simone plants a flag for upscale golf near Rome, Italy has been home to some of Continental Europe's most luxurious golf resorts for years. In the heart of Tuscany, guests of the Rosewood Castiglion del Bosco resort can access the Tom Weiskopf-designed golf course at The Club Castiglion del Bosco, which styles itself Italy's only truly private club. The property was developed by Massimo Ferragamo, son of the legendary designer Salvatore Ferragamo. In 2014, the secret-shoppers of the luxury golf travel newsletter Golf Odyssey visited the property and awarded both the lodging and dining a practically unheard-of rating of A+, calling Castiglion del Bosco "simply the most magnificent and delightful European hideaway we’ve had the pleasure of visiting."
Italy's island region of Sicily is home to another of the country's great retreats: Verdura Resort, located due south of the city of Palermo on Sicily's southwest-facing coast. Verdura, part of the Rocco Forte collection of resorts, has two championship courses by Kyle Phillips - West and East - plus a 9-hole short course. The seaside setting makes it the Italian golf place I'd most like to visit.
Plenty of other courses and resorts make Italy a less-obvious but potentially very worthwhile destination-with-golf, if not quite yet a true-blue golf destination. One option around Tuscany that is somewhat more attainable than Castiglion del Bosco is Castelfalfi, home to 27 holes in a valley that compliments the hilltop resort. The 18-hole Mountain Course opened in 2010 and was laid out by architects Wilfried Moroder and Rainer Preissmann and renovated in 2021.
Italian fashion's influence on golf
Armani. Gucci. Ferragamo - the list of iconic Italian brands that have helped drive fashion forward is long and distinguished. Their sense of style and refinement has had some influence in golf, too.
Those with a couture affinity can get an Armani polo or a vintage pair of Ferragamo golf shoes, but the current brand of primary interest to golfers is Chervò, founded 40 years ago by brothers Manfred and Peter Erlacher as a skiwear brand in Verona. Now, Chervò's holdings include not only winter apparel but golfwear as well, including some of the best apparel money can buy. An official licensee of the 2023 Ryder Cup, their polos are likely about twice as expensive as most golfers are typically game to spend, but the proprietary fabrics they use take them several notches above most others in terms of moisture-wicking and overall comfort, especially on warm days.
Recent Ryder Cup followers may recall that starting in 2021, Team Europe has been outfitted by Loro Piana, a high-fashion brand under the LVMH banner (along with Louis Vuitton, Tag Heuer, Dom Pérignon and others) that makes Chervò's prices look incredibly reasonable. Loro Piana will also dress Team Europe at Marco Simone, with pieces from the Euros' uniforms available for purchase at Loro Piana's shop in Rome during the tournament. The pricing on those pieces ranges from $520 to $3,450.
Italy's legendary tradition of shoe design extends to golf, too. Venetian designer Baldovino Mattiazzo co-founded Duca del Cosma in 2004 and has been the driving creative force behind the stylish golf shoe brand ever since, even after the company was purchased by Dutch businessman Frank van Wezel in 2016. With an extensive collection of men's and women's designs that range from the traditional to the more modern and sneaker-inspired, Duca del Cosma presents a strong, high-quality counterpoint to the more established golf shoe brands.
Other Italian golf apparel and shoe brands
Hydrogen - Particularly active in tennis but having debuted a line of golf apparel in 2022, this 20-year-old brand styles itself "the unconventional luxury fashion brand."
Marbas - Private-label brand that includes a line of golf apparel made in Italy.
Nebuloni - Century-old family-operated producer of hand-made leather golf shoes worn by Miguel Angel Jimenez and Gary Player.
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