Peter Harradine is a third-generation golf course architect who has designed over 160 courses, including the Abu Dhabi and Jebel Ali links. Also president of the Swiss Business Council, he's a passionate advocate of all things Swiss. Lorraine Chandler discovers why a man with an English name is more Swiss than cheese fondue.
There are not many people who can say their family has been designing golf courses for three generations and still fewer who can say they received their first set of clubs at 6. But Peter Harradine is a man with golf in his blood.
It all began in the 1920s when Albert Hockey, the stepfather of Donald Harradine (Peter's father) became one of the first golf professionals to teach the game indoors, creating an indoor golf academy at Harrods in London.
The academy was admired by some visitors from a Swiss golf course, who invited Hockey to redesign the Badragaz golf course in the east of Switzerland. He took his family with him and they stayed in Switzerland for about five years.
But as the family prepared to return to England, Donald, then about 14 and already a golf pro, decided to stay on and work at the Quellenhof Hotel.
Looking back, Peter recalls there was no love lost between his father and his stepfather.
Donald designed his first golf course in Switzerland in 1929 and established Harradine Golf. Since then the company has designed and overseen the construction of over 200 golf courses in Europe, Africa, Asia and the Middle East, with budgets ranging from $850,000 (about Dh3.12 million) to $50 million (Dh183.9 million).
Donald married Babette, a Swiss Italian, and the family later went on to live in Caslano, a small village in the Italian part of Switzerland.
Harradine confides he still owns a house there, on a road appropriately named Via Golf. While his father retained his British passport, Harradine considers himself Swiss. Italian is his mother tongue and he is also fluent in English, Swiss, German and French.
With such a golf pedigree, it's no surprise he was coerced into playing golf at a young age. Peter declares it was "absolutely compulsory" and admits that he was shocked when one of his sons expressed more interest in tennis than golf.
During his school holidays, the young Peter was given some unsolicited work experience on golf course construction sites.
While his father had a handicap of plus five, Peter confesses he never advanced beyond a (still admirable) five.
Nevertheless, he embraced the family passion and at 21, went to the US to learn more about the landscaping and golf design and construction. He worked for a company called Colonial Gardens, while also doing part-time courses in landscaping - all the time moving around the country wherever work took him.
After two years, he returned to Switzerland where he started working as a contractor - often with his father and at other times with some of Europe's most prominent architects.
In the 1970s, he started designing golf courses. In 1976 he was offered a job in Dubai to install a drip irrigation system along a road, a process he'd learnt in the US.
At the time, Peter didn't even know where Dubai was, but he decided to come for six months.
"The company I was working for went bust," he says, "But I met a very nice (UAE national) and we decided to set up Orient Irrigation Services in 1977," he says.
Peter is managing director of Orient, which today is a giant in its field with 950 employees. The company has worked on major projects such as Mamzar Park, Zabeel Park, Jumeirah Beach Park, Dubai Media City and Jebel Ali Golf Resort and Spa's gardens and golf course.
Indeed, Peter has never lost touch with the world of golf. Even when he agreed to head Orient, he stipulated he would return to Europe every month to design golf courses.
When the condition of his father, who was suffering from Alzheimer's, began to worsen about 20 years ago, Peter gradually took over the business and, 15 years ago, formed a new company, Harradine Golf. Today the company - which has links with Orient - has offices in Dubai, Germany and Switzerland.
A man of tremendous energy, Peter is a former president of both the European Society of Golf Course Architects and the European Institute of Golf Course Architects. He has thrice been elected president of the Swiss Business Council (SBC) in Dubai, a position he currently holds.
His table is covered with leaflets, brochures, paper and Post-its. He answers phone calls (in Italian, German and English) and writes down short messages on any scrap of paper at hand.
Searching for some documents for me, he enlists the help of several staff members and I even find myself rifling through papers on his desk in an effort to retrieve the documents.
But the tall and lean, 61-year-old Peter insists he thrives on "organised chaos".
I
I think golf has really taken off in the Middle East, whereas it has declined in its traditional markets. Dubai has seven-and-a-half golf courses (the ?half' being a nine-hole course), with many more planned.
To be a real golfing destination, you need about 20 courses. Unfortunately, a lot of the golf courses are connected to real estate projects, which is not ideal, but that's the only way to make golf pay.
I think Tiger Woods is the greatest athlete on earth because of the way he can play despite the tremendous pressure on him every time he plays.
I have not been able to play golf since
I had a back operation a year ago, and
I really miss it. Golf has been my life.
I like going out and enjoying myself.
I believe if you work hard but don't profit from it, you're stupid. I don't understand why people fly economy class when they have the money to fly business class. Money shouldn't be for the bank; it's for spending and you can't take it with you when you die.
I go back every month to my village in Switzerland; it's the only place where I really feel at home. I have a house next door to my mother's (my father died in 1996).
I miss the company of locals at the café and the way we used to talk about old things. Whenever I'm there, I just slot back into village life.
I hated England when I went there at 13. I missed my village, my friends and family. My father sent me partly to improve my English and that's something I'm glad about now.
I think I was also sent because I was a bit unruly and never really excelled at school. I stayed with an aunt in Leamington Spa (in Warwickshire) while I was in England, from age13 to 18.
I hated the work my father used to make me do during the summer holidays. From the age of about 11, I was drafted for one month every summer (to do) digging and shovelling.
My father used to say, "Work is digging and shovelling." I used to say, "No, it's managing the people digging and shovelling."
He was of the old school, and believed you should work hard when you're young. I learned to drive tractors and bulldozers from the age of 11. As the son of the boss, I got to do a lot of things. Now I'm glad I got so much practical experience.
Me
Me and my wife:
My wife, Nikky, is well known in squash circles. She founded the women's league here, and is a very good squash player.
We met in Perpignan, southern France, when I was designing a course there, and we got married in the British embassy in Dubai almost 25 years ago.
Despite being of Greek origin, she's not very Mediterranean in character; she's quite reserved. She works with Orient as a part-time accountant.
We both travel a lot but despite all the running around, we've both tried to give our children as much time as we could. You could say she's been quite a doting mother.
Me and my children:
I hope I've been a good father but I've had to travel a lot for work, so that was tough and I wish I'd had more time to spend with my children when they were growing up.
Michael, 23, is studying landscape architecture in Rappeswil in Switzerland, and I hope he'll join the family business. He used to be a very good tennis player in his mid-teens, but he didn't want to commit his life to tennis.
To my joy, he then came over to golf.
Lawrence, 17, is at a tennis academy in Barcelona. He recently won an International Tennis Federation (ITF) tournament (the UAE ITF Junior Championships) in Abu Dhabi and is number 620 in the world (junior rankings). (I am extremely upset) he's more interested in tennis than golf. I think my wife's probably responsible for that.
Natasha, 19, is a beautiful girl.
She's studying hospitality at the Emirates Academy of Hospitality Management. She's an extrovert, like her father, and is very sporty.
Me and my golfing family:
It took a lot of courage for my father to stay on in Switzerland when he was only 14. He spoke Swiss German fluently because he had grown up in Badragaz.
There weren't many golf courses being built at that time, so he had to be versatile and (keep moving to wherever there was work). He was a very adaptable guy. He was both the golf pro and manager at Berne, where I was born.
It was strange for my mother moving around Switzerland. Being Swiss Italian, she has a very Latin character, but she adapted quickly. She became the secretary of the club at Lucarno. My whole family (life) revolved around golf.
My father was so good that he beat a British Open champion. He wanted me to go into the golf business, so at 21, I went to the US to work for a company there, while also doing courses.
Those two years were very enlightening for me. It was a completely different lifestyle. Everything was so enormous compared to my village and landing in New York was quite overwhelming. The way they did business was different too.
In Europe, deals were concluded with a gentlemanly handshake and artisans worked on golf courses. But in the US, they (would discuss) contracts, deadlines, specifications; everything was so precise - the way it is now around the world.
At 23, I went back to Europe and worked as a contractor. There wasn't really a family business to join (it was simply known as ?Don Harradine') but I did a lot of work for my dad as a contractor. I am a contractor at heart, because I enjoy creating a golf course.
When you're the architect, someone else implements your vision, which is a different thing.
My mother told me the other day, "I hope you let Michael do his own thing if he joins the company," and it reminded me of my dad. We used to have terrible arguments because it was his company and everything was taken personally. But now Harradine Golf is a company with a philosophy.
Me and developing the businesses:
Despite preferring contracting, I got into designing in the 1970s because I realised it was getting more difficult to both design and build courses.
You have to separate the two to avoid a conflict of interest. (In my career,) the two functions startedto separate (when I was) in the US.
I decided on architecture because as a contractor I would forever be implementing other people's ideas instead of my own.
When I came here and set up Orient Irrigation Services in 1977, I continued to work a lot in Europe and until about 10 years ago most of my projects were there, although my home has been (Dubai) for the last 29 years. In fact, Germany was our main market until nine years ago.
There is an overlap between the two companies I run: Harradine Golf (where I'm chief architect) and Orient Irrigation Services (where I'm the managing director).
We designed the golf courses at Abu Dhabi, Jebel Ali and the Doha Golf Club in Qatar, which is home to the European Tour's Qatar Masters. We have some courses under way at Sharjah, Ras Al Khaimah and Dubailand, and have signed up for four more in the UAE.
Myself
After your family, what's the most important thing to you?
Well yes, first is definitely family. Then it's important to me that the company is doing a good job. I love my work and I couldn't ask for anything better.
Do you enjoy travelling all over the world and designing golf courses?
I used to enjoy it more. Now you spend all your time queuing up because of security measures. As I travel so much, I'm used to doing a lot of work on the plane. I delegate a lot but I love being on site. Right now we're designing an incredible course in Hyderabad, India.
What role does the SBC (Swiss Business Council) play?
We mainly help Swiss companies network and make contacts. We're not tied to anyone so we can talk freely. There's a committee of nine and between us we have 250 years of experience in the Gulf. I have been elected president three times and I take it very seriously.
Every market has its peculiarities. Sometimes we help people bridge the gaps to understand each other better. I think the council is very important for fostering links.
The Dubai Chamber of Commerce and Industry has recognised the role of business councils, because people who've been here for a while can help newcomers who are coming from a completely different environment.
Has golf taught you any lessons about life?
You can determine whether someone is a cheat, a serious guy or a liar by how he plays golf. You should never do business with anyone before first playing golf with him.
It's a great game because the handicap system lets you play with those not as good as you and you can still have a good game.
What was the best golf course you've worked on?
I always say my favourite courses are the one I've just finished and the one I'm about to start. You should never say which one is your favourite because we have designed 200 golf courses and it wouldn't be right to say which one I like the best.
It also depends on the client and the atmosphere, as to how much you enjoy designing a course.
"Golf, like measles, should be caught young," said P. G. Wodehouse. Do you feel it's necessary to start when you're very young, as you did?
That applies to any game. If you want to be good, you need to start young. But golf is great because it's a family game. Unlike (sports like) tennis, you can play with your grandfather.
It's a great social game because you can chat while you play it. While saying that, it's the most difficult sport on earth. It allows one to think. And if you give someone time to think, he'll definitely (mess) up.
