Tag Archive for: EcoBunker

EcoBunker at unique ‘golf lounge’

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EcoBunker at unique ‘golf lounge’: One of the most unusual and innovative golf projects in the world is taking shape in Mexico City, and EcoBunker technology is playing a critical role.

Architect Agustin Piza was commissioned by his client, a leading Mexican executive, to build a golf practice facility in the grounds of the client’s under construction new house. “I think my client had a regular putting and chipping green in mind, but I don’t do regular things,” says Piza.

EcoBunker at unique 'golf lounge'

The architect conceived something he calls the ‘Golf Lounge’, a large, freeform putting green and surrounds that enables users to practice any golf shot they like from up to 70 yards. At the centre of the construction is a large revetted sand bunker, which is where the EcoBunker solution is deployed. And, in the heart of that bunker is to be found the centrepiece of the whole ‘Golf Lounge’ concept – a fire pit.

“The central bunker is key to the entire composition,” says Piza. “During the day you can practice all types of shots from 70 yards in. Flops, bump and runs, lag putts. Anything you want to create, it’s there. It is a multi-purpose area – during the day the family can enjoy either practicing golf or playing in the sandbox. In the evenings, you turn on the music, turn on the lights, turn on the firepit and relax. You can still putt around it, have a putting contest, whatever you like. I knew I needed the central sandpit to be revetted. I did my research and with the evidence available to me EcoBunker is the most proven system in the world for constructing revetted bunkers, especially in climates like Mexico City’s. I spoke to Richard Allen, the inventor of synthetic revetting, who I had met several times at EIGCA functions and said ‘Send me your best installer’. He sent me Llewelyn Matthews who did a fantastic job.”

Piza says that this job, because it is in a domestic environment, was rather different to most architectural projects. “The safe rule in architecture is that form follows function, but in this case I wanted the function to follow the form. This meant extra detail to creative and engineering work,” he explains. ”I wanted the client and his family to fall in love with it just by seeing it through the windows of their home, whether or not they were golfers. So I conceived it as a kind of ‘grass sculpture’ that would be both beautiful to look at and functional. If it is just a golf facility, it is a waste of space to anyone who doesn’t play golf. This way, it is something for the entire family to enjoy.”

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Capillary Concrete & EcoBunker At Ryder Cup Venue

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Capillary Concrete & EcoBunker At Ryder Cup Venue: The first phase of construction work has been completed on the rebuild of the Marco Simone Golf & Country Club course outside Rome, the venue for the 2022 Ryder Cup. This phase has seen the back nine of the golf course reconstructed, and the holes are now growing in. The front nine is to be rebuilt at a later date.

The construction crew provided by contractor SOL Golf, finished its work at the end of May. For the last three weeks of work, a specialist subcontract team from EcoBunker was on site installing about 500 metres of the company’s AquaEdge lake edging product on two separate ponds, one on the left of the home green, and the other to the front right of the sixteenth, with logistic and labour support from SOL. EcoBunker CEO Richard Allen, the creator of AquaEdge, says: “Dave Sampson, the course architect from European Golf Design, wanted to make the sixteenth into a feature hole, as he knows that more Ryder Cup matches end at the sixteenth than anywhere else. It’s a pretty drivable par four, downhill, with a huge spectator area around the green.”

Capillary Concrete & EcoBunker At Ryder Cup Venue

The bunkers of the back nine are shaped, but are planned to be finished in September, when they will be lined with the Capillary Concrete system and then filled with sand. Sampson himself specified Capillary Concrete for the course’s bunkers, having seen its performance elsewhere – including at Le Golf National in Paris, host to the recent 2018 Ryder Cup.

“The first phase of bunker works amounts to about 5,000 sq m of Capillary Concrete,” said the company’s European representative Kneale Diamond. “Construction of the second nine is expected to start as soon as the first nine holes are open – and to be finished by next May.”

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Two Ryder Cup Courses For EcoBunker

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Two Ryder Cup Courses For EcoBunker: Working on a course for a Ryder Cup is a great achievement for any golf construction professional. To work on two in the space of a week, though, is pretty remarkable. But that’s what EcoBunker site manager Louis Palser will have done by the end of next week.

Louis has spent the last two days at Le Golf National in Paris, supervising EcoBunker’s part of the construction of the 2018 Ryder Cup venue’s new state of the art practice facility, which is being managed by golf consultant Alejandro Reyes (the former superintendent of Le Golf National). Flying directly from Paris to Rome, Louis moves on to the Marco Simone club, currently under reconstruction at the hands of European Golf Design architect Dave Sampson, in advance of its starring role in the 2022 Ryder Cup. There, for ten days, he will be working alongside EcoBunker’s top construction specialist Llewellyn Matthews installing EcoBunker’s AquaEdge lake edging product on the sixteenth and eighteenth holes.

Two Ryder Cup Courses For EcoBunker

Quite some going for a young man who is new to the golf business. Louis joined EcoBunker last year after studying civil engineering at Salford University, because ‘he wanted to use his construction knowledge, work outdoors and gain plenty of travel opportunities’, and spent 18 weeks last year on the company’s job at the new Dumbarnie Links in Fife, where he rose to be deputy site manager under Llewelyn Matthews. Now, he’s comfortable leading jobs, and has worked on EcoBunker projects in the UK, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium and France.

EcoBunker CEO Richard Allen says: “With our contracting business growing rapidly we’ve had to invest in new construction management talent, and Louis has rapidly become an important part of our growth.”

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Busy Show Season For EcoBunker

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Busy Show Season For EcoBunker: Leading synthetic bunker edging solutions provider EcoBunker is getting ready for a busy few weeks as the winter trade show season approaches.

EcoBunker will be exhibiting at the BTME show in Harrogate, England, next week, and then, two weeks later, at the Golf Industry Show in San Diego, California. Chief executive Richard Allen and global construction specialist (and former Walker Cup golfer) Llewelyn Matthews will attend both events, along with a selection of EcoBunker’s global distribution network, and several high-profile clients.

Busy Show Season For EcoBunker

At BTME, EcoBunker was instrumental in creating a new feature for the show –an eighteen-exhibitor ‘scorecard challenge’. All attendees who interact with the eighteen participating exhibitors – and get a stamp on their ‘scorecard’ to illustrate the fact – will be entered into a draw to win £1,000. Find the EcoBunker team on stand 210. Two weeks later, at GIS in San Diego, EcoBunker can be found at booth 2762.

Richard Allen said: “Because of the proximity of the two big trade shows, this is always a busy, but exhilarating part of the year. It’s an opportunity to catch up with old friends and make new ones. Llew and I are especially looking forward to talking to prospective clients about our increasing capacity on the contracting side of the business – he spent much of last year on site at Dumbarnie Links in Scotland, our largest contracting project to date, with Llew and his team building seventy bunkers on the course.”

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EcoBunker and Capillary Concrete Collaboration

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EcoBunker and Capillary Concrete Collaboration: The Bukit course at Singapore Island Country Club, originally designed by Scottish legend James Braid in 1924 is the venue for a new partnership between two of the worldʼs leading bunker technology firms. At SICC, Capillary Concrete and EcoBunker have come together to produce bunkers that are fully sealed; lined with Capillary Concreteʼs industry leading product, and with a low edge produced using EcoBunkerʼs patented synthetic solution.

Five bunkers have been built under the supervision of EcoBunker’s global installation specialist, Llewelyn Matthews on the short par three seventeenth hole of the Bukit course, which was the only hole on the course not to be included in a renovation completed in 2017. After the success of this trial work, the club intends to move forward with a similar treatment of all 80 bunkers on its Island course.

EcoBunker and Capillary Concrete Collaboration

Although the EcoBunker solution has been most commonly associated with revetted bunkers as seen typically on links courses, Capillary Concrete CEO Martin Sternberg, who was at SICC for the initial build, says that this joint offering is ideal for use in a much wider range of circumstances. “This low edge solution is ideal for courses that want dramatic reductions in the cost of bunker maintenance,” he said. “For us at Capillary Concrete, we know our product works well for the base of bunkers, but we have many clients for whom the EcoBunker edging solution is an important source of added value. Combining the two solutions produces bunkers that look good and are totally sealed and impervious to penetration.”

Richard Allen, EcoBunkerʼs CEO, said: “We have known for a long time that our solution works very well for these low edged bunkers as well as for the more traditional-looking revetted bunkers with which we are associated, but it is great to get this kind of recognition from a company of Capillary Concreteʼs status. The links between us are strengthening as evidenced by our joint portfolio and many new clubs are set to benefit as the pipeline of future similar projects grows’’

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