PROFILE

Graham Papworth, founder of GNP Golf Design Pty. Ltd. is the incumbent President of the Society of Australian Golf Course Architects. After joining the Society in 1990 and spending much of the ensuing time serving as Honorary Secretary, Treasurer and Vice President, Graham was elected by his peers to the top position in November 2009. In this capacity, Graham sits on the Board of the Australian Golf Industry Council.
GNP Golf Design was formed in 1993 after Graham recognised a need for a quality golf design service that was not necessarily associated with a high profile name or the costs and conditions that are often connected to such commissions. Subsequently, GNP have provided a first class golf design service to many clients and clubs directly or in association with other architects, consultants, builders and golf professionals. To date, GNP has prepared golf designs for projects in Australia, New Zealand, Fiji, South Korea, China and Japan.
Graham established his golf design skills during the decade prior to forming GNP Golf Design by working with golf design companies such as Marsh Watson International Golf Course Architects where he was a founding staff member and senior designer contributing to a number of highly acclaimed courses of that era including: The Vines, Horizons and Secret Harbour in Australia, Mission Valley in Japan and Kingfisher in Saipan.
Graham’s broader design skills however were founded in the decade prior when working in civil engineering and planning he gained valuable experience in many design disciplines and a Certificate in Civil Engineering. He was a founding staff member of Geoffrey Burchill and Partners, an innovative consultancy firm that subsequently became the training ground for many of today’s successful development consultants.
It is this technical grounding, combined with creative flair that has seen GNP Golf Design perfectly placed to design and oversee the implementation of the wide variety of golf projects and course renovations that appear on their ‘PROJECTS’ pages. This multi-disciplinary experience has proved especially successful when integrating golf and residential development, whether that is on new projects such as ‘Noosa Springs’ or finding development opportunities within existing golf courses such as ‘The Willows’. Several clubs have enjoyed the benefits that have flowed from freeing up land for sale or development while at the same time improving their course layouts.
All projects are different and GNP’s forte is designing to the client’s specific brief and tailoring their services to suit individual project needs with every aspect being personally overseen by Graham Papworth.
In 2010, Graham attended the World Forum of Golf Architects at St Andrews. Whilst in Scotland he took the opportunity to inspect the Old Course and several other traditional Links thus complementing previous study trips to a number of the world’s great golf courses.