Is this the Augusta of Scotland?

Ground was broken for the new clubhouse at The Renaissance Golf Club at Archerfield on Wednesday, following the start of work on three new holes last week.

Ambitious Renaissance owner and managing director Jerry Sarvadi has high hopes of landing a top event in the near future.

Despite the club missing out on an attempt to host the Scottish Open earlier in the year, Sarvadi - who travelled to East Lothian from his US home to witness this week's ground-breaking - is confident his club will earn high acclaim in future.

In fact, one leading expert has tipped the course to rival legendary Augusta National Golf Club, Georgia, which each year hosts the Masters, one of golf's four majors.

Sarvadi told Courier Sport: "Probably the best way to describe my ultimate ambition for Renaissance is that I want to build a course that's the best-conditioned in the UK and where people will really enjoy the experience, then go away saying, 'That was one of the best golf experiences of my life'." "We had a guy come down here on Monday who's written 13 books on Bobby Jones [co-creator of Augusta].

"He made a comment to me that I thought was a little presumptuous but he was calling us the 'Augusta of Scotland'. Who knows if we can live up to that but the aspiration is certainly there." The club is a hot tip to break into 'Golf Magazine's' top 100 golf courses, considered by many the most prestigious of course ranking lists.

And Sarvadi believes a place among the very top tier is within reach once Renaissance fulfils three ambitions.

"['Golf Magazine' writer] Joe Passov recently picked us in three courses he believed would break into the next top 100," Sarvadi explained. "Time will tell but we think the club can continue to grow and attract more and more people for three reasons: the new holes, the new clubhouse and, hopefully at some point, getting a big tournament.

"I think if we do break into the top 100 that is a milestone; that's significant. That's something we think would really set us apart." The new developments are hoped to be completed by early summer 2013, ahead of The Open at nearby Muirfield, and bring the total investment at the club since 2008 to £14 million, funded by the Sarvadi family, private members and individual investors.

The new holes, being designed by Tom Doak, who originally created the course, are set on a peninsula overlooking the Forth and are hoped to dramatically increase the course's playing challenge. They were granted planning consent on June 7 and construction began last Monday.

Meanwhile, the new clubhouse will be laid out over four levels and feature extensive hospitality and private dining facilities, as well as luxury bedroom suites. In the longer term, the creation of a 20-bedroom luxury lodge is also being considered.

"The new developments are a major milestone and their importance relates to our desire to host a professional tournament," Sarvadi explained.

"We're anticipating construction time at about 18 months. That will put us in a good state to have completion about 90-100 days prior to The Open.

"We've had conversations about these improvements with the European Tour and the Royal and Ancient Golf Club and that's why we're doing all this. We feel like there's a high probability that at some point in the near future we will be hosting an event.

"I see us possibly hosting something like the Senior British Open or Scottish Open." Sarvadi added he felt the club had benefited from missing out on securing the Scottish Open, as he feels Renaissance will be in a better shape to host a tournament next time around.

"The last few years have been hard on the world but we still don't have any bank debt at all so we feel like we're well positioned and we feel the club has come out the stronger," he said.

With the course's reputation rocketing, a big-name tournament doesn't look far off.

And with the ambition to be the very best, that could be just the start for The Renaissance.