vietnam For Schmidt & Curley, Another Milestone

     Later this year, the most prolific course designers in China are expected to open their first course in Vietnam.
     I’m talking about Lee Schmidt and Brian Curley, the architects behind two of the world’s most talked-about golf resorts, Mission Hills Shenzhen and Mission Hills Haikou on Hainan Island. The Scottsdale, Arizona-based duo is now making headway in Southeast Asia, as it’s been commissioned to design a pair of 18-hole golf courses for an emerging golf community in the Cu Chi District of Ho Chi Minh City, the nation’s largest metropolis.
     C. T. Sphinx Golf Club, which will occupy 500 acres in Tan Thong Hoi Commune, will be flanked by 200 European-, Mediterranean-, and Asian-style villas, and its 108,000-square-foot clubhouse will include restaurants, meeting space, boutique shops, and entertainment areas for children. One course will be public, the other private.
     The community is being developed by an affiliate of a local conglomerate, C. T. Group, which controls three dozen entities engaged in real estate development, retailing, entertainment, and other enterprises. Tran Kim Chung, the company’s president, is said to have studied at Harvard.
     Vietnam is touting itself as “the next Thailand” for golf tourism, and it just so happens that Schmidt and Curley have designed three courses in Thailand: the Plantation course at Siam Country Club in Pattaya, Amata Spring Country Club in suburban Bangkok, and Chiangmai Highlands Golf Club in Chiangmai.
     Their first course at C. T. Sphinx is under construction and could open in late 2013. C. T. Group hasn’t yet announced when the second course will be built.

     The original version of the preceding post first appeared in the November 2012 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.