It's seems fitting that the second New Zealand Women's Open should find its new home on a new course designed by a rare kiwi - a woman.

Northland-born Kristine Kerr has been responsible for most of the design work at Pegasus Golf Course, which will host the $400,000 Pegasus New Zealand Women's Open this week, a co-sanction event with the Australian LPG and the Ladies European Tour.

The course forms a key part of the inventive Pegasus Town development 25kms north of Christchurch, which will sponsor the Open for the next three years. Kerr is now based in Christchurch where she has established her own golf course design company, although has spent much of her life in Australia and has worked around the globe for the design companies including one owned by the legendary Gary Player.

She grew up on the Gold Coast where her father was involved in a golf course development, which introduced her to resort communities with the accent on outdoor living and sporting facilities. After graduating with a degree in Landscape Architecture and Town Planning, Kerr worked in town planning before moving to Singapore to join her family, working for a landscape architect and golf course design company.

This period coincided with the rapid expansion of the golf boom in Asia in general and China before moving to UK and ultimately working for Player's golf course design operation in Europe for two years.

She returned to golf design in China with an American company in Beijing before being appointed as design-construction supervisor for a Gary Player course.

"Most designers are not keen to be based on site fulltime but I thought it was great fun and helped round out my involvement in the total process. It was an experience that's for sure as getting a project out of the ground there is no mean feat."

After visiting her parents who had moved back to the Gold Coast, Kerr looked at opportunities back in New Zealand, taking a role with Boffa Miskell, a New Zealand company looking for a golf course architect to work with them on Pegasus.

"The project was still very much in the planning stage when I arrived. The corridors for the golf course were largely created. Essentially the layout and detailed strategic design is my own." Kerr is delighted with the results at Pegasus, which has already led to work on a second course in the city.

"I'm happy with the golf course but importantly those who have played it seem to be happy with it," said Kerr. "In my mind it fits the brief I was given to create a high end residential and community golfing facility. It is very rewarding after four and a half years or so to go out there and see the usage and acceptance it is already getting. I have no reservations either about its capacity to host an event as important as the New Zealand Women's Open."

Kerr has also recently become the first woman to be accepted into the Australian Society of Golf Course Architects.