Q&A With Seamus Golf's Akbar Chisti

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Akbar and Megan Chisti are co-founders of Seamus Golf, the beloved Oregon-based artisans specializing in uniquely original accoutrements that adorn the traditionalist's golf style.

I love all of their efforts to blend traditional golf tartans and textures with modern simplicity. Most recently they've ambitiously tried to reimagine the golf shoe, as I reviewed here and have since enjoyed the prototype on a wet linksland masterpiece, with nothing but good things to report.

Akbar updates us on one of golf's most interesting companies in this Q&A:

GS: Why a golf shoe?

AC: I am a huge fan of walking and playing golf barefoot. This is the closest thing I've ever experienced to that.  Our brand has evolved a lot in six years, starting with tartan club covers and ranging to a variety of items like heavy metal objects like the church pew inspired bottle opener.  Each evolution has been the result of meeting an artisan, maker, or designer that we are inspired to work with.  In this case, we met a local cobbler / retired Nike Innovation Kitchen designer that we really Jived with and lived in our hometown, Portland, Oregon. 

Mike Friton is a genius, and truly one of the pioneers of simple & free barefoot movement. The modern shoe is in many ways a cast, and the whole shoe philosophy in golf is designed to keep you physically stuck to the ground.  I've played many rounds barefoot and felt that you can actually have better balance and feel with less interference between you and the grass.  I've found it can be difficult to really communicate my love for barefoot golf without sounding like I'm from some strange religious cult, further I have to encourage folks that playing in the Feel Player to try out what I'm talking about is the only way to see the righteous path of SEAMUS GOLF.

GS: What’s the response been like so far? Where does the Feel Player go from here?

AC: Frankly, we didn't know what to expect.  I've always gone into new ventures figuring that if we don't find success, all of my friends are gonna do well with the Christmas gifts.   At this point, I can say that we've had enough pre-orders that we won't have to resort to giving away our inventory!  The biggest feat about this project making the shoe right here in Portland, Oregon.  While most athletic shoe supply chain doesn't exist on the stateside, we found it could be interesting to try to make a shoe using many of the same techniques from our head covers and golf bags.  Something that makes the rest of SEAMUS special is how custom we can get being hands on at every step of the way.  Golfers are going to find it compelling when we can do that with footwear.

GS: What else is new from Seamus would you like folks to know about?

AC: Man, I don't know....there's a lot going on here but I'm just excited ya'll wanna hear about our shoe!

GS: Your products turned up at the Masters this year, The Players and of course has been a staple of the US Open for a few years now. How important is it having your stuff at the major events?

AC: We didn't have typical set of growth goals when we got started at SEAMUS.  Be at Bandon Dunes, then Chambers Bay, US Open, and finally provide covers for the US Ryder Cup Team.  Now that we've had the honor of adding the Players and The Masters, I have to say that these achievements have been incredible for our self confidence.  At this point, I feel like we have the credibility to apply our creative energy to the most highly regarded applications in our sport.  It's hard to measure exactly how much each event contributes to our growth, but we know as a whole we're growing and further we can only conclude that being at the majors is a contributing factor.  There's the other more personal selfish part that our team loves being a part of these special events.  I was a CPA streaming every event live to my phone up until 2012, to think that 5 years later I'd be at them in this manner is a thought that never would have crossed my mind.

GS: What’s the most interesting place you’ve played golf lately?

AC: The most interesting thing I've done on a golf course lately was basically go dune buggying on Mammoth Dunes, the second installment of the Sand Valley story.  Just before they started seeding, I had the rare opportunity to go blasting through the dunes and see the whole course with Michael Keiser Jr.  We were jumping through dunes and getting air time over tee boxes.  This was the funnest thing I may have ever done.  But that doesn't answer the question about most interesting place I've played golf lately.  Have you ever heard of Royal Hawaiian Golf Club in Oahu?  I think at one time it was a Fazio, then remade by Greg Norman.  Locals call it Jurassic Park, and I have to say with a great amount of certainty that this is by far the best value / experience driven golf course I've ever played.  SO dramatic, as are most Fazio courses, but through these crazy prehistoric vegetation you just think a Pterodactyl is gonna come grab your golf cart.  By the way, this is one of the few places I will abide by the Riding or Riding option, given that they most probably have no defibrillators on the course.


A Feel Player introductory video:



Here I am testing the Feel Player at Prestwick, photo by Alex Miceli.