George Peper:

Courses New and Old

From the Middle Kingdom to the Home of Golf, the author's misadventures and revelations from the world of architecture

By George Peper

Here’s a good one for you. Roughly one year ago, I was invited to design a golf course. In China.

Now, what I didn’t know about golf course architecture—and for that matter, China—could have filled an encyclopedia. That made me a perfect fit for the developer—he had no budget.

This all came about as a result of a little business I’d launched a year earlier—ChinaLinks Golf Consulting—wherein I partnered with two Chinese publisher friends to represent American course architects for opportunities in China. (We signed six distinguished designers—Mike DeVries, Dana Fry, Don Knott, Mark McCumber, Kyle Phillips and Baxter Spann—and to date we have four projects off the ground—or is it in the ground?)

At an early business strategy meeting, I said to my partners, “Hey, if you guys should find a developer who can’t afford to hire a proper designer, tell him he can have me for next to nothing.” I was joking—well, half-joking. Like just about every serious golfer, I’m a frustrated architect.

Then suddenly, unfathomably, I was summoned!

Brimming with ignorance, I flew to Beijing, hopped a connector to Shenzhen, lunched ceremonially with the developer, squinted briefly and cluelessly at a topographical map, and then hiked through three life-threatening kilometers of Rambo country.

The site was gorgeous—600 rolling acres, clad with lush tropical vegetation and nestled in a stream-threaded valley at the nexus of three massive hills. But even I could see there would be some difficulty putting a golf course on it.

Then, as we stood atop one of the hills, the developer dropped his bombshell. He didn’t want a golf course—he wanted two courses, along with a palatial clubhouse, a five-star hotel, 50 condominiums, and an American school (don’t ask).

“Give me a sketch,” he said, “and if I like it, the job is yours,” adding inscrutably “and this will be the first of many major projects we will do.”

Right. Now all I had to do was speed-school myself in the fine points of schematic design, geological engineering, soil agronomy, subsurface irrigation, turf analysis and artful earthmoving—not to mention chopstick dexterity and conversational Mandarin.