Behind the unassuming fences and walls on south University Boulevard, lies one of Denver's most exclusive and storied neighborhoods:  Polo Club.  This rare urban enclave of gracious estates was built, as its name suggests, on the grounds of a polo club where the city's elite ran their ponies in the 1020s and '30s.  The original polo team, the "Freebooters," was formed in 1909 by the Denver Country Club and practiced on the clipped fairways of the golf club - to the deep annoyance of duffers.  Finally, by 1020, golfers, who had lost patience with the "little presents" left on the green, threatened the Freebooters with the boot.  Polo players set out to find a more suitable location for their horses.

Lawrence C. Phipps, who would later build his Belcaro Mansion a few blocks to the south, and three other Denver businessmen purchased 160 acres just east of the Denver Country Club for $62,000 in 1920.  As writer Jennifer Collins recounts in her history of Polo Club, the men commissioned local architects Fisher & Fisher to build a gracious Spanish Mediterranean-style clubhouse at 5 Polo Club Road for the princely sum of $300,000.  (Fisher & Fisher also designed Phipps's "Belcaro" mansion.)  Stables went up on land bounded by Alameda Avenue and Steele Street.  Lafayette Hughes, one of the initial investors, built a gracious home for his family at 2755 E. Exposition Avenue.  Until 1936, when the Depression finally put an end to such expensive hobbies, Denver's horse set played polo three times a week at the club.

Open spaces and private hedges
In 1941, with play abandoned, the Polo Club closed and parcels of land were sold off.  A concerned Hughes formed the Polo Club Homewoners Association in 1946 to ensure orderly development and protect his own considerable investment.  The association's first order of business was to build high walls and plant hedges to screen residences from traffic noise and prying eyes.  Bounded roughly by University Boulevard, Alameda Avenue, Exposition Avenue, and Steele Street, the resulting neighborhood developed in stages over the next 30 years.  As Phil Goodstein explains in his book, "Sough Denver Saga," the 40 homes of Polo Club Place were built in the 1950s and 1960s on a 34 -acre tract in such a way as to preserve mountain views and open spaces.  The larger lots range in size today from about half an acre to 2 acres.  In the 1960s, as Collins recounts, Polo club residents undertook a hard-fought zoning battle to successfully prevent the Calvary Temple on south University Boulevard from developing a 46-acre tract of the Old Polo Grounds with 10-story apartment buildings, an enormous sanctuary and a school.  During the late 1970s, the condos and custom patio homes of Polo Club North were built on the site of the former stables, adding a new dimension to the neighborhood. 

Today, Polo Club offers residents the rare combination of a superb city location, adjacent to the Denver Country Club and the shops of Cherry Creek, and the quiet of landed country estates.  The architecture ranges from formal Georgian manses and Spanish-style estates to stunning modern masterpieces and elegant patio homes.  Circular streets wind past large manicured lawns and vegetation carefully groomed to appear as though it has grown wild.  With only a few entrances into the neighborhood - including a couple of gated ones - residents control unauthorized access and relish their cherished privacy in what has become one of Denver's premier neighborhoods.