four new courses a year. That dried up almost completely. We had to rely on developing our existing course portfolio and that gradually happened as the world got back on its feet and clubs started to look to improve their courses. “We were already working on improvements to Turnberry during the changeover of companies to get it ready for the Open in 2009 so that was helpful in establishing our reputation. The first Open venue that commissioned us was Royal Lytham & St Annes: we pulled out all the stops to secure that one. Royal St George’s wanted to look to see who they would use, and we had to prove ourselves all over again despite working for the club with Donald. Gradually, we grew the Open advice to eight of the ten Open venues. “Internationally, implementing the new course I designed with Donald at Goodwood, on a beautiful site to the north of Toronto, was important. Hirono (pictured on page 42) came later and signalled that our boundaries were pushing further and further away from home.” The enormous success of M&E means that the firm has expanded to include two other designers, Mike Howard and Greg Smeaton, and two ‘architectural visualisers’, Patrick Roseveare and Cam Main (M&E produces its own CGI stills and videos). Chris Huggett now serves as chief operating officer. This makes it, along with European Golf Design, pretty much the largest design firm in Europe, and figuring out who works on each job must be a major challenge. “In many cases, there is a natural connection to either Tom or me when new opportunities arise – some through contacts we each have and some through where we are already working,” says Ebert. “Workload is also a consideration as, on occasions, one of us has more capacity to make a visit than the other. As a result of our detailed plans, we can take on a lot of projects and still serve them comprehensively to produce the highest quality results. We make numerous visits during projects (as an example, I went to Hirono 13 times in ten months during that project), but the shapers and contractors know Photo: Victoria Golf Club Victoria GC on Vancouver Island, Canada, appointed Mackenzie & Ebert to produce a masterplan in 2024. The details of the proposals are now being drawn up “ The first Open venue that commissioned us was Royal Lytham & St Annes: we pulled out all the stops to secure that one” 45
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