Jeff Lawrence, ASGCA (Gary Player Design), may be the only golf course architect to work with and for Jack Nicklaus, ASGCA Fellow; Tom Fazio, ASGCA: and Player. This unique perspective, and an impressive international portfolio, were topics of a “Tartan Talks” podcast with Golf Course Industry.
Lawrence has been to enough countries over his 14 years with Player to fill a passport, and then some, including India, Honduras, Congo, South Africa, China, the Middle East and Canada. “We’ll go anywhere golf is possible. Ninety percent of our work is outside the United States.”
In traveling to remote locations, Lawrence has to be sure that what he designs will be able to be maintained. “We are trying to create something special, but not so complicated that they cannot maintain it,” Lawrence said. “We use materials that may be hard to get (irrigation parts, etc.). It is important to educate the people because they need to manage it. The design is easy, implementing and maintaining it is the challenge, so we try to set them up for success during the design process.”
The complete “Tartan Talks” podcast featuring Jeff Lawrence, ASGCA, can be heard here.