Archive by Author

Yas Links is ‘Different’ Class

Posted on February 17, 2010 by in Yas Links

Mike Galemore walks the course and talks to designer Kyle Phillips who has created something completely different in the Middle East – a traditional-style authentic links course that brings a new experience to the region.

SEEING is believing, they say – and Yas Links is a golf course that has to be seen to be believed. Walking the course last month with designer Kyle Phillips was akin to being transported to the seaside links of St Andrews, Royal Birkdale, or Ballybunion.

I’ve played many of the treasured links of Scotland, Ireland, England and Wales over the past half century and invested in more balls than most in the process but if I could have disregarded the warm sun on my back and the calm aqua-marine ocean I could have been back home battling the elements.

It’s remarkable how Kyle Phillips has created a genuine, traditional links course out of nothing. Where there was once flat desert wasteland there are now rolling wide fairways, deep bunkering, wispy rough and inviting, sloping greens with their traditional heartbreaking run-offs. It’s pure coastal-style links on a par with Kyle’s other links masterpieces, Kingsbarns near St Andrews and Dundonald near Troon in Scotland.
Read More…

Aldar: Yas Links

Posted on December 30, 2009 by in Yas Links

“Yas Links is on schedule to become a unique and memorable golfing destination in the Middle East.”

-Chris White, General Manager of the Aldar Golf Division talks us through this magnificent, traditional golf development on Yas Island, Abu Dhabi.

Kyle Phillips continues to build his name and reputation on delivering ‘the purest’ form of golf. All over the world there are naturally beautiful golf courses where the architect has been able to meander golf holes through natural vegetation or landforms.

The challenge of some sites is to create a natural looking golf course from what might have been a relatively flat piece of land – Kyle Phillips has done that in the most dramatic way on Yas Island.

The design and building of the golf course not only involved the creation of landforms but also in gaining the maximum aesthetic and playing challenge from the coastline. The long, linear site has no fewer than eight holes that play parallel to the sea front whilst all 18 holes offer the most spectacular views of the beautiful Arabian Gulf.
Read More…

Kyle Phillips brings a taste of Scotland to Yas Island

Posted on December 23, 2009 by in Yas Links

“What makes yas links so intriguing,” designer Kyle Phillips tells Golf Digest, “is how traditional it is. Because if you think about it, in golf terms there’s currently nothing in the UAE that’s even remotely traditional.”

For a country that revels in glitz and extravagance, the idea of recreating an ancient throwback of a golf course and placing it directly opposite the gargantuan structures of the extra-terrestrial styled Ferrari World and the Yas Marina Circuit, seems peculiar. On one side of the road is more technological know-how than you’d find at the headquarters of NASA, and on the other is a golf course that’s decidedly minimalist, from the sparing use of cart paths to the windswept features that are so joyously informal and unkempt.

And the best possible tribute we could pay designer Kyle Phillips as we stood on the tee of the par 3 8th hole, is that were it not for the backdrop of Ferrari World, looming like an enormous red UFO, not to mention the 25 degree warmth of the sun, we might easily have been in Scotland.
Read More…

Capturing the Mystery of the Links

Posted on November 12, 2009 by in Yas Links

Worldwide Golf talks to KYLE PHILLIPS on how he went about transforming the ‘captivating’ site of Yas Links into an “authentic links style course – and the first true links course in the UAE. It was clearly one of those sites that required turning up the volume and creating bold links-like landforms.”

Q. The setting for the course is spectacular. What were your thoughts when you first visited the site?

A. As you can imagine, I look at a lot of sites, but there was something about this site that captivated me, particularly the prospect of transforming the site into an authentic links style course and the first true links course in the UAE. At that time the site was a 3,200 metre long strip of fiat, sandy, undelined shoreline along the southwestern edge ofYas Island. It was clearly one of those sites that required turning up the volume and creating bold links-like landforms.
Read More…

PGA Sweden National, Links

Posted on October 16, 2009 by in Kyle Phillips, Links Course, PGA Sweden

So much has been said and written about the transformation of Kingsbarns in Scotland from ploughed fields into stunning linksland, that the development team at PGA of Sweden National could have identified architect Kyle Phillips with a Google search for ‘turning featureless farmland into great links golf.

However, we can be pretty sure this wasn’t the case, as it was only after Phillips had been engaged that a plot of featureless farmland near Malmo in the south of Sweden was chosen as the site for the PGA’s impressive new golf facility. Identifying an architect early in the development process is an approach that Phillips has championed in a previous edition of Golf Course Architecture (see GCA 2, p52), arguing that the architect’s expertise can be employed for identifying the site’s suitability for development, with a view to saving costs and minimising development time.

Phillips’ Kingsbarns has been one of the success stories of modern golf development. High rankings aside, it is an aesthetic delight. There are few better examples of a course that appears to have been crafted by nature, whereas every contour was in fact the work of architect and construction team.
Read More…

Links Course looks set to be a Shore Winner

Posted on October 7, 2009 by in Yas Links

“Phillips, a renowned golf course architect, has created the region’s first true links course.”

ABU DHABI // Kyle Phillips has completed a whistle-stop visit to the Emirates from his California base to give a thumbs up to what could well become one of the most attractive destinations for golf enthusiasts the world over.

Phillips, a renowned golf course architect, has created the region’s first true links course – a 7,450 – yard masterpiece on Yas Island that makes maximum use of the mangrove-filled coastline.

The course, commissioned by property developers Aldar on a site close to the Formula One racetrack, is due to open early next year.

Phillips, whose design work has been displayed in more than 20 countries, notably the United Kingdom where Kingsbarns in Scotland and The Grove, London are his most famous efforts, is confident this is among his best courses.
Read More…

Klein on Design: No. 18 at Kingsbarns

Posted on September 19, 2009 by in Kingsbarns

Bradley S. Klein. Golfweek’s architecture editor. offers his opinion on one great hole:
Yards: 444. par 4
Architect: Kyle Phillips,1999
Where: Fife, Scotland
Event: Alfred Dunhill Links Championship,Oct 1-4

It’s great because . .. Kingsbarns, now a decade old, revolutionized Scottish golf with a retro-links look that combines scruffy old dunes, deep bunkers and greens contoured to function as hazards when approached from the wrong angle. The finishing hole calls for a drive into a prevailing wind that quarters from the right and brings fairway bunkers into play on the left side. From there, the approach is to a steeply sloped green pitched above a nasty burn – the only forced-carry water hazard in play from a fairway shot at Kingsbarns – that will capture any approach that comes up a little short.

It would be even better if… they would rebuild the steep back-to-front green and marginally modify its slope. As for high handicappers
looking to lay up on their second shots, the fairway tilts toward the burn and leaves an awkward third shot from a downhill lie to an uphill green – virtually impossible for the kind of player who has laid up. It would help here to counter slope the fairway and provide just a little more cushion for the high-handicapper, lest he or she finish the round with golf ball in pocket (or in the water) onthe stem approach.

Brad Klein
Golfweek
September 19. 2009
www.golfweek.com

‘It’s Time to Buy Gold’

Posted on September 17, 2009 by in Kyle Phillips

Kyle Phillips is the creator of Kingsbarns, The Grove and many of the world’s finest golf courses in 20 countries. Writing here for GBD, he believes the golf development industry has only itself to blame for many of the current ills, but feels with the right development model, the golf business can still succeed in a challenging environment.

While historians will describe autumn 2008 as the beginning of the current economic crisis, they will only be describing the moment in time when we realized that we were sick. The virus was in our system long before. Sure, we were warned by a brave few that we were on the brink, but we did not want to believe them. Only after several “too big to fail” companies failed, and the markets tumbled, did we realize we had all caught the flu.

The golf industry is not immune either. Alarming numbers of “too big to fail” residential golf communities are on the ropes, being taken over by banks, or being ploughed under. In Dubai, not even the marketing brand of Tiger Woods has been enough to make the development sell.

But the problems we face today within the real estate development sector of the golf industry did not begin recently. This virus has been building up in our golf industry bloodstream for over four decades. It was in this period that golf started to become more incorporated in residential communities. Often the developers did not play or understand much about the game, but they did know that with a golf course, they could sell real estate for a premium. Unknowingly at the time, the real estate development industry began redefining the ‘essentials’ of the modern championship course for the golf industry.
Read More…

Morocco & a Kingdom of Golf

Posted on September 1, 2009 by in Al Maaden, Kyle Phillips

“…AI Maaden, a high-end developer of golf resorts, who have commissioned Kyle Phillips, arguably one of the hottest designer of the modern era to take on the task of making their course a Moroccan star.”

THE FIRST PORT OF CAll FOR OUR BYE-DAY MOROCCAN golf trip is the Palmeraie Golf Palace & Resort, an oasis of luxury and refinement nestled in the heart of a lush, cool palm grove ten minutes from the hustle and bustle of Marrakech. This exquisite property is richly decorated in intricate Moorish designs that feature large archways, opulent furnishings and a decor in rich earth tones. After checking in we are asked to make ourselves comfortable on a collection of carpets and cushions by a water fountain in the tiled foyer area.

Before long, resident tea-maker Mr Aziz Igouzoulen appears through an archway wearing a flowing white robe and a maroon fez hat, carrying a silver tray with an elegant metal teapot packed with fresh mint leaves, tea and sugar. After the tea has brewed for a few minutes, Aziz makes a spectacle of pouring the fragrant golden liquid from a great height into the small decorative glasses. With a grin wider than Tiger Woods after winning a major, he hands us the tea, overflowing with the delicious aroma of fresh Moroccan mint and says, “Welcome to Marrakech and I hope you play some good golf.”
Read More…

Wilshire’s Reclaimed Glory

Posted on July 14, 2009 by in Wilshire

Sometimes it takes a while for the identity of a place to reveal itself

You’d beexcused during the first few holes at Wilshire Country Club if you didn’t have a clear sense of the site. The course sits in a leafy envelope, with towering canary pines and eucalyptus trees insulating the fairways from the surrounding residences of Hancock Park. Even as late in the round as the ninth tee, the prelude to a rolling, up-and-over 437-yard par-4, you might have trouble discerning the proper line for your drive. Until, that is, you look up and see the distinctive “HOLLYWOOD” lettering on the distant hill and, to its right, the neon El Royale sign atop the legendary Spanish art deco apartment building – the former hotel that was a residence of many studio-era film stars. All of a sudden things become clear. The ideal aiming point is just between these two landmarks. And then you know where you are.

Welcome to one of Los Angeles’ historic golf courses. Wilshire Country Club wasn’t always so well ensconced. Upon its founding in 1919 as one of them town’s pioneer country clubs, Wilshire sat right out in the open, on a broad, un-treed tract far beyond the western edge of in-town development.
Read More…

Top