Designer tips Castle Stuart event to spark Trump's envy
Published Date: 05 July 2011
By Martin Dempster
MARK Parsinen, who co- designed Castle Stuart, has claimed fellow American Donald Trump, having regularly boasted that his course currently in construction in Scotland will play host to an Open Championship one day, will be looking on with envy when the Highlands venue stages the Barclays Scottish Open for the first time this week.
The man who is now the managing partner of the acclaimed Inverness course believes becoming part of the local community, as he has done since he first earmarked the spectacular site on the banks of the Moray Firth for the layout that is staging one of the European Tour's biggest events just two years after opening, has helped endear him to the locals more than Trump has managed through overseeing his project near Aberdeen from the other side of the Atlantic.
Parsinen told The Scotsman he is convinced Trump's latest flying visit to Menie Estate a fortnight ago was timed to try and deflect some of the attention away from Castle Stuart as it prepares to stage an event boasting five out of the top nine players in the world and is "sure" even his gregarious compatriot will be a tad jealous with the global publicity the rival course is about to receive.
While not on the same scale as the protests Trump has experienced in the North-East, Parsinen revealed neighbouring property owners had also raised objections when plans for the Castle Stuart course he designed in tandem with Gil Hanse were unveiled, but is convinced that his decision to live on the course - he moved into a cottage during the construction phase and is still there - played a part in the multi-million pound project subsequently being embraced.
"I've been living in the UK on and off for 40 years. It helps to live here," said Parsinen, an entrepreneur who encouraged a number of investors, including a handful of silent partners, to cough up the cash for a course that was chosen by Barclays to become the new home of the Scottish Open after the event's successful run at Loch Lomond came to an end last July.
"Take Donald Trump, and I don't mean to be critical because people operate in different ways. He flies in, has some press conferences and gets photographed on the golf course. He is going to do a wonderful project, there is no doubt about that, but he's not living in the community, getting his hair cut, buying his groceries, going to the local restaurant and making friends.
He's running the project from 40,000 feet in his private jet.
"I'm part of the community now and I am grateful for the support we have received from the local community.
"One of the first things we did was invite over the neighbours to tell them exactly what we were doing. We owed it to them as neighbours.
"They all objected to having their lives disturbed but it was interesting at the planning meeting that they stood up and said that philosophically they objected to the project because they wanted to maintain their lifestyle but added that they knew the people doing the project and said they knew we were going to do a great job."
Asked if he felt the timing of Trump's most recent visit to Menie Estate had been significant, Parsinen, said: "Absolutely". As for the billionaire casting an envious eye towards Castle Stuart over the next few days, he added: "Oh, I am sure. He is an extremely skilled marketeer and promoter and I think he would be absolutely interested in staging an event of this nature. For us, it has huge value. We are pretty well known now in Scotland and the UK but in America no-one really knows us. This is going to help us become better known, there's no question about that."
Parsinen, who earned a BA in Strategic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania before completing a special course on the same subject at the London School of Economics, revealed the second phase for Castle Stuart is already in the pipeline and that will start with the construction of a bespoke dormy house and nine-hole pitch and putt course. Plans have also been drawn up for a second 18-hole course on the Inverness side of the existing course.
"We're not done here," added the man who first made his mark in Scotland with the construction of Kingsbarns near St Andrews. "We will never stop trying to make this a better golf course while there are other aspects to the project. A second golf course, for example. It goes around the bay to Inverness and will be a complementary golf course.
"What I mean by that is that will be a course where I could play golf with my grandson or it will be somewhere to play in the morning before playing Castle Stuart.
"We've also got a 51-bedroom dormy house on the drawing board at the moment and we are hoping to start that next spring. It is all about golf. It will be located at bottom end of range and people will be able to go straight out of it and either hit balls on the range, do some putting or play the pitch and putt course that we also have in the pipeline."