Rusacks, St Andrews: the hotel at the end of the eighteenth

The world's first purpose-built golf hotel has stood beside the last fairway of the Old Course since 1887. After a top-to-bottom rebuild it is the one to book if you want to watch the final putts drop from your balcony — or from a rooftop steakhouse called, inevitably, 18.

There is a moment, walking up the eighteenth on the Old Course, when the town stops being a backdrop and starts to close in around you: the R&A clubhouse on the right, the shops of Golf Place ahead, and on the left, running the length of the fairway, a long red-sandstone hotel with balconies from which people are watching you. That is Rusacks. It has been watching golfers finish since 1887, when a German émigré named Wilhelm Rusack decided that the game which was starting to draw visitors to St Andrews needed somewhere for them to sleep, and built the first hotel in the world designed for the purpose on the best piece of ground he could find.

It has been many things since — a barracks in the war, a slightly faded grande dame under a chain for twenty years — and in 2021, after a rebuild that doubled it in size and put a restaurant on the roof, it became what it should always have been. The Old Course Hotel has the seventeenth; Rusacks has the eighteenth, and the eighteenth is the one with the crowd.

Why go

For the position, which no amount of money can now buy elsewhere. From the front rooms and the roof you look straight down the last fairway to the Swilcan Bridge and the first tee beyond it, with the West Sands and the sea off to the left. At seven on a summer evening, with the light coming in low and the last groups walking up, it is the best view in golf, and you are not paying a green fee for it. The first tee is two minutes' walk; the town centre is around the corner on Golf Place; the museum is across the road.

And for the way it has been done. Marine & Lawn, the group that bought it in 2019, restores old golf hotels along the Scottish and Irish coasts with a house style that is easy to like: dark wood, tartan used sparingly, old photographs of caddies and champions, brass and leather, a fire lit whenever it can be. It is a luxury hotel that does not feel like an airport lounge, and after the Macdonald years that is a relief.

The room

Ask for the front. The original 1887 building holds the rooms with the balconies over the eighteenth — the Swilcan rooms, ten of them, are the ones everyone wants and they go first — and the corner suites with windows on two sides. Rooms in the 2021 extension behind are newer, quieter and a little larger, with the same palette of tweed, dark timber and brass, and some look over the roofs toward the sea; they are the sensible choice if you are out all day and the balcony is a luxury you would not use. Bathrooms throughout are marble and generous. The beds are the sort you plan your evening around.

One thing to know: the hotel is on the fairway, and the fairway is public. Golfers, walkers and, on Sundays, the whole town go past under the windows from first light. Most guests love it. Light sleepers should ask for the back.

The table

Three places to eat and drink, one on each level of ambition. On the roof, 18 is the showpiece: a steakhouse and bar with a wall of glass over the eighteenth green and the clubhouse, a locker of dry-aged Scotch beef on display by the door, Cumbrae oysters, chateaubriand and tomahawks for sharing, and a terrace with a putting green on it for people who have not had enough. Book the window at sunset a week ahead. On the ground floor, The Bridge is the all-day brasserie: wood-fired pizzas, hand-rolled pasta, charcoal-grilled fish, coastal-Mediterranean in feel with cane chairs and striped banquettes, and the room for breakfast. Below, One Under is the pub — low ceilings, a good pint, whisky, and the place the caddies drink when they are not at the Dunvegan two doors along.

"The Old Course Hotel has the seventeenth; Rusacks has the eighteenth, and the eighteenth is the one with the crowd."

The detail people remember

Breakfast at the window as the first groups come up the eighteenth. Nobody in the world has a tee time on the Old Course before the people who booked it eighteen months ago, and they walk past your coffee at eight in the morning with the whole town behind them and the sea in front. It is the best free seat in golf, and it comes with the room.

Who it is for

Golfers with a tee time, obviously, and especially those who want to walk off the eighteenth and up the steps to a drink. Anyone who wants to be in the middle of the golf without the scale of the resort across the road. Couples who want the town on foot and the view from the pillow. And, in July 2027, anyone who has booked far enough ahead: the hotel sits on the closing hole of the 155th Open and its balconies will be the most sought-after seats in Scotland that week.

It is not for anyone who wants quiet gardens and a country drive; for that, Rufflets. Parking is tight and on the road, where stray drives from the eighteenth have been known to land, so arrive by taxi from Leuchars if you can. And it is a busy hotel, particularly at breakfast, when the room can feel more like a clubhouse than a five-star.

A little history

Wilhelm Rusack came to St Andrews in 1874, married a Scot, ran a couple of small hotels and in 1887 opened the Marine Hotel on Pilmour Links, designed by David Henry in a northern-European style that still looks faintly Hanoverian among the Scottish stone around it. It grew north in 1893 and south in 1911, took his name, and became the address for visiting golfers for a century; Arnold Palmer is said to have stayed nowhere else in St Andrews. It served as a barracks in the Second World War. In 2019 AJ Capital, the American group behind Marine & Lawn, bought it from Macdonald Hotels and spent seven million pounds and two years rebuilding it, adding a 42,000-square-foot wing and the rooftop that gives it 18. It reopened in September 2021 with 120 rooms, up from 70, and the view it had always deserved to make the most of.

What to do nearby

The first tee, two minutes; walk the whole Old Course on a Sunday. Read: St Andrews Links, more than the home of golf.

The R&A World Golf Museum, across the road, for an hour before your tee time. Read: The R&A World Golf Museum. [when published]

The West Sands, three minutes; two miles of beach at low tide.

The Dunvegan, two doors along, for the golf pub every caddie will tell you about.

The other hotel on the Old Course, at the other end: Read: The Old Course Hotel, the hotel golfers aim over. [when published]

The Open, July 2027, on the fairway under the window. Read: The Open returns home, St Andrews 2027.

Know before you go

Address: Pilmour Links, St Andrews, Fife KY16 9JQ — on the eighteenth fairway of the Old Course, beside Golf Place.

From the Old Course: Two minutes to the first tee; you can see the eighteenth green from the front door. Market Street five minutes; the museum across the road.

Hours / season: Open all year. 18 for dinner nightly and Sunday lunch; The Bridge all day; One Under evenings. All three take non-residents; book 18 for a window table.

Price: Rooms from around £300 a night in winter and from around £600 in summer; Swilcan balcony rooms and suites more. Open week 2027 by package only, long sold.

How to book: Direct with the hotel; ask for the original building and a balcony by name.

Good to know: Limited parking, on-street and by arrangement — come by taxi from Leuchars. Gym on site; no spa (the Kohler Waters Spa at the Old Course Hotel takes day guests, five minutes' walk). Dogs: ask. Gin-blending sessions with Eden Mill on the second Saturday of the month.

Best time: Late September, when the light on the eighteenth is long and gold at seven in the evening and the rooftop terrace is still warm enough to sit out.