When Bonita Bay Club's leadership described its newly approved clubhouse as the final phase of a multi-decade transformation, the phrase read like the last line of a long project plan. Members voted with strong support in May 2026 to move forward on a $110 million, 140,000-square-foot building. The announcement called it the closing chapter of work that began when members bought the club from its original developer in 2010.
Residents who have lived here through the last two years might read that word differently. Since late 2024, something at Bonita Bay Club has finished, opened, or broken ground roughly every twelve months. The pattern is the more interesting story than the number, because it tells you what to actually expect if you spend your mornings on the paths or your evenings at the marina this year: not a calm interlude before a grand unveiling, but the same rolling construction rhythm the club has kept for over a decade, dressed up this time as a finale.
The Pattern Before the Announcement
Lay the recent milestones next to each other and the cadence is hard to miss.
- 2024: the Naples campus clubhouse, a short-game practice area, a Golf Academy, and a Club Fitting Lab were completed, along with upgrades to multiple pro shops, seven dining venues, and the club's tennis, pickleball, bocce, and croquet facilities.
- November 2025: an employee housing complex opened on the property.
- April 2026: the Esperia-Seaglass clubhouse, serving the Esperia South and Seaglass towers, reopened after a full renovation.
- May 2026: members approved the $110 million main campus clubhouse, described in the club's own announcement as the final phase of the transformation.
Four milestones in roughly sixteen months is not a club winding down. It is a club that has kept a nearly annual construction cycle running since members took ownership, during which they have put approximately $250 million into capital projects across the property. Whatever "final" means in the press release, the operating reality for anyone who golfs, dines, or walks the grounds is that something has been under a tarp or a permit sign here for a very long time, and the smart bet is that something else will be within a couple of years of this one wrapping.
What the New Clubhouse Actually Adds
The scale of the current project is worth sitting with on its own terms. The planned building will run 140,000 square feet in a Florida coastal design, built in two phases on the club's 2,400-acre main campus. The plans call for an expanded 55th Hole restaurant with indoor and outdoor seating and an integrated sushi bar, a new Sunset Lounge for casual drinks, and a rooftop bar overlooking the golf courses and the Gulf beyond. A 360-person ballroom will double as a daily card room, and the plans also include several private function rooms and a lower-level parking garage.
Fred Fung, the club's CEO and General Manager, framed the project less as a building and more as a statement of ownership structure:
"This project is far more than a new clubhouse. It reflects our identity as a member-owned club and the commitment to continuous reinvestment in our amenities."
The detail that matters most for anyone using the club day to day is the club's own commitment that member access to amenities and dining will continue through both phases of construction. For a project of this size, that is not a small promise. It means the practical experience of eating at the 55th Hole or booking a tee time should not disappear for a season the way it might at a club that has to shut its doors to rebuild.
The Renovation That Wrapped Weeks Before the Next One Was Approved
If you want proof that this club does not pause between projects, look at what happened just one month before the $110 million vote. In April 2026, Clive Daniel Home and Lutgert Construction completed a full renovation of the Esperia-Seaglass clubhouse, the shared amenity space for Esperia South and Seaglass residents. The finished spaces include a redesigned Social Room built around a custom fireplace wall and bar, along with a new Card Room and Billiards Room.
Maryanne Hubbell, lead designer at Clive Daniel Home, said the goal was a space that "feels both elevated and effortless," and designer Blake Evans called the finished result "a true transformation in every sense." For Lutgert Construction, the project marked another milestone in what the company calls its enduring relationship with the property, not a one-off job. That word, enduring, is the more honest description of how Bonita Bay actually operates than final ever will be.
The One Amenity That Never Pauses
While the clubhouse work moves through its phases, the part of daily life at Bonita Bay least likely to be touched by any of it sits on the Imperial River. Bonita Bay Marina is owned by a group of resident investors rather than a third-party operator, and that ownership structure shapes how it runs through the slow months as much as the busy ones. The marina keeps wet slips, dry storage, fuel, bait, a boat launch, and on-site repair open year-round, and Sweetwater Lifestyles operates a boat club out of the same docks alongside two charter companies.
Backwater Jack's, the restaurant at the marina, shifted to its summer schedule on May 7, 2026, running Thursday through Saturday from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. with a 3 to 6 p.m. happy hour. The restaurant was the first in Lee County to endorse the Eat Local Lee initiative, a detail that says more about its supply chain than any menu description could. In February, the marina hosted its annual boat show with Fish Tale Boats, open to the public through the community gate, which is worth noting mostly because it shows this is a property that keeps running public-facing events even inside a gated community during a year of major construction elsewhere on campus.
Two Memberships, One Address
It is easy to conflate Bonita Bay Club with Bonita Bay itself, and the club's own marketing does not go out of its way to separate the two. Homeowners belong to the Bonita Bay Community Association, which handles the roads, common areas, parks, and the private beach park. Bonita Bay Club, with its golf courses, tennis courts, and the clubhouse now under construction, is a separate and optional membership on top of that. A resident can use the community's paths, parks, and beach without ever joining the club, and plenty do. The clubhouse headlines belong to the smaller, optional layer of the community, not the whole of it.
Small Signs of the Same Pattern
The club's own recent history is full of smaller items that point the same direction, toward a place that treats "finished" as a temporary condition:
- Croquet professional Sherif Abdelwahab appeared on the cover of the 2026 Spring Issue of Croquet News following his American Six-Wicket National Championship win.
- The FineMark Women's Pro Tennis Championship returned to the club April 27 through May 3, 2026, drawing a field that included more than 20 players who had competed in the 2025 US Open, even though the tournament's winner takes home roughly $15,000 against the $110,000 a first-round US Open loser earned that year.
- The fourth annual Lee Health Charity Golf Tournament, held January 12 on the club's newly designed Sabal Course, sold out and raised $111,000 for Lee Health.
- Separately, the FineMark Women's Pro Tennis Championship, the Groovy Golf Classic, and the Oh, What a Night Charity Event together raised more than $591,000 this year for the Lee Health Cancer Center, pushing the club's cumulative giving to Lee Health past $2.75 million since the tournament's start.
- Becky Salaun, the club's Director of Communication, marked 25 years on staff this year, a tenure that spans nearly the entire arc of the transformation described above.
None of these are construction stories. All of them describe a club that keeps adding, upgrading, and marking milestones rather than settling into a finished state.
Reading the Next "Final Phase" Announcement
None of this is a criticism of the project or the club. A member-owned organization that keeps reinvesting is doing exactly what member ownership is supposed to produce. The point for anyone living inside the gates this year is narrower and more useful: treat "final phase" as marketing language rather than a forecast, and plan your calendar around the club's actual track record. Something will likely still be finishing here in 2027, and the club's own commitment to keep dining and amenities open throughout construction is the part of the announcement worth remembering, not the word final.
At Potter Trinity, our builder background means we read announcements like this one the way a contractor would, phases, square footage, and access commitments first, marketing language second. If you ever want that same lens applied to a property you already call home or one you are still deciding on, we are glad to talk it through.
