Who would you choose - Feature Specific ?

[Patrick_Mucci]

If you were going to study specific features, what one architect would you choose to study each of the features listed below.

And WHY ?

If you want to add additional features, and the architect you would chose to study them, list that as well ?

Tees
Fairway bunkers
Cross Bunkers
Topshot bunkers
Offset bunkers
Frontal Greenside bunkers
Lateral Greenside bunkers
Rear greenside bunkers
Elevated greens
Depressed greens (no prozac required)
Green configurations
Green contouring
Green Surrounds
Water hazards
Mounds
Fairways
Routings

[RJ_Daley]

Pat, I'm not trying to be evasive, but your question involves a lot of time to address each feature and one might then just start listing favorite archies and holes that one has seen, rather than who to STUDY.  

Each of those features involves construction talent as much as design ideas and aesthetics.  They are all found on varying soil and weather regions, and so they may not function the same from one region and course to another.  

I'd rather address the question from a construction point of view and answer who one would study that builds these features well and successfully, on a consistent quality basis.  I think that various archies can design these features, and know what they are supposed to look like.  But which ones can make them function properly at a given location is an important study.  

[Patrick_Mucci]

RJ,

I was thinking along the lines,that, for example, for greenside bunkers, Charles (steamshovel) Banks would be a great study.

He seemed to accentuate those features.

I don't think you have to address the entire list all at once, you can do it piecemeal, and update your initial response through the "modify"  or "quote" buttons, thus expanding on your initial response..

[RJ_Daley]

Ok Pat, since half time is on...

Charles Banks would get my vote for ponds, digging and shaping.

I started to answer going down the list and just can't come up with one archie.

I'll try a couple...  

I'll go with Raynor and Langford for elevated greens.  

Fancy bunkering, flashed sand and splashed over turf lips, Thomas.  Natuaral, Bunkerhill and Doak.

Cross bunkers with turf mounds Langford or Raynor, fancy ones with flashed faces, Tillie.

routings, C&C, Doak, Ross, Mack

[Mike McGuire]

Pat -

As far as a feature not on your list....

Alex Smith built the best circus ring I ever played. As you would expect some green committe ruined it. It used to be twice as high and completely encircle the green.

[Jay Cox]

A few answers:

green contouring:  Perry Maxwell, both to get a picture of the grand scale on which one can contour greens if one tries and to try to figure out a pattern of 1) when highly contoured greens work and when they don't (I think Maxwell built some in both categories, though well more of the former than the latter) and 2) what patterns exist among truly great highly contoured greens.

frontal greenside bunkers:  Based only on having seen Riviera, my tentative answer is George Thomas.  It's the most interesting course I've ever seen in terms of depth perception problems around the greens, and I think most of that is created by frontal bunkering (including some of it 20-40 yards back down the fairway, perhaps too far to be termed "greenside" but hardly fairway bunkering).

rear greenside bunkers:  Raynor, mainly because I'm intrigued in comparing play on Raynor courses with well-preserved rear bunkering (like Camargo) to play on those where the rear bunkering has been butchered (especially Yale).

More broadly, I would study the terrain just over the greens at The Old Course, where it seems to me there exists a tremendous variety of recovery shots from long as well a significant variance in how bad it is to be long (adding an extra level of thought to the approach, versus a course where anything long meets a similar fate).

[Patrick_Mucci]

Pat -

As far as a feature not on your list....

Alex Smith built the best circus ring I ever played. As you would expect some green committe ruined it. It used to be twice as high and completely encircle the green.

Mike,

That's a pretty neat feature.

Have you seen many others like it ?

[Mark_F]

Patrick,

I'd choose Doak, and study routings.

Doak follows the land like the old architects, but still has the advantage of technology to shift a little dirt if need be.  

[Adam_F_Collins]

I've never heard of a "circus ring" in golf before. Interesting. Anone else seen/heard of/played one of these before? Any variations? Thoughts?

[Mike McGuire]

Pat -

No- I had never heard of a "Circus Ring" on a golf course until this.

The green pictured is from the Wawashkamo Golf Club on Mackinac Island.  Upper Michigan (1898)

The island has incredible history (war of 1812) and allows no cars. We took a horse drawn taxi up to the course and played with hickorys.  Like steppin back in time.

(I don't know the  dude in the background. He was looking for his skull as i was taking pics)

[Evan Fleisher]

That is a very cool picture and a fascinating concept...never seen one before!

Any other features of interest on the course, or just this one oddity?

[SPDB]

I personally detest the concept. If the ball for some reason runs through the green and lodges on the bank (in what is often tall grass), it makes for a nearly impossible recovery shot.

Ken Dye implemented a modified one on his redesign of the 14th at Bedford G&TC. It is an uphill approach, often requiring a long iron shot, which makes it tremendously difficult to stop the ball. Often the shot runs through the green and buries in the bank that semicircularly rings the back of the green, and which rises almost immediately from the putting surface. It is a horrible greensite.  

Mike - How long is the hole.

[corey miller]

Give Ken Dye credit for trying to recreate his version of a classic feature the circle ring.  Certainly he would not want a ball to roll off a green, that would be unfair.  I admire his high regard for the classics.