A municipal golf course in the shadow of Augusta National is being held up as one of the sport's most compelling recent projects, after a year-long renovation transformed a long-neglected community facility into a layout designed by some of the biggest names in the game.
Augusta Municipal Golf Course, affectionately known to locals as The Patch, has reopened following a complete rebuild overseen by architects Tom Fazio and Bo Welling, with a new nine-hole short course designed by Tiger Woods. The project was backed and coordinated by Augusta National Golf Club, whose members' patronage has quietly turned a dilapidated public facility into a showpiece of Masters Week.
"It's truly one of the coolest projects in golf and the golf world will get to see it during Masters Week," one commentator said of the reopening, describing it as one of the most impressive projects in the sport.
The historical significance of The Patch gives the project depth beyond the names on the design bill. The original course opened in 1928, predating Augusta National itself, and was built on land where World War I soldiers once trained. Decades of underinvestment had reduced it to such poor playing conditions that its nickname was said to derive from a local rule allowing players to place their ball on the nearest patch of grass.
Despite the deterioration, the course never lost its hold on the Augusta community. Generations of local golfers learned and loved the game there, and the renovation has been pitched to the city not as a vanity project but as a restoration of a civic institution.
"Still, this has been home for many in a town that is truly golf obsessed, and now their home course will feel brand new," the narrator said.
The pricing structure has drawn particular attention. Where most major renovations carry greens fees designed to quickly recoup construction costs, The Patch has reopened at rates that would be considered exceptional even at modest public courses, let alone at a project backed by Augusta National money and carrying Fazio and Woods design credits.
"You simply can't find these prices for tee times anywhere," the narrator said.
The Tiger Woods-designed short course adds a specific marquee attraction. Woods' design business, TGR Design, has been responsible for a handful of high-profile private projects, but a nine-hole public short course in the Masters host city is the kind of accessibility-focused work he has frequently said he wants his firm known for.
The timing of the reopening, pegged to Masters Week, is no accident. Augusta National's backing ensures that the wider golf world, visiting players, media, officials and fans converging on the city, will encounter a restored Patch at the very moment the sport's global attention is focused there. For local golfers, the result is a course reborn. For the wider golf audience, it is a rare example of a major club putting substantial resources behind the public game in its own backyard.
The project's legacy will be judged over years, not weeks, as operating economics and local demand test whether the model can be sustained. On the strength of the early reception, however, The Patch has been rebuilt not just as a course, but as one of the more unexpected stories of the 2026 Masters.
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*Originally published on [Golf News Global](https://golfnews.global/article/augusta-municipal-reborn-fazio-welling-woods-revive-the-patch). Visit for full coverage.*
