Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll

[T_MacWood]

"The natural or the wild was the way they utilized the plants within the garden (in opposition to the Victorian carpet bedding) and the way they melded the garden with the outside world. The garden extended the house into the midst of Nature."

“Sissinghurst and Great Dixter are enclosed as well, but of course you already knew that."  


Tom MacWood;

So what, all the better to seamlessly meld the house and garden through enclosed walls and straight into the outside world and into the midst of Nature, right?

The star of Capablilty Brown’s landscape gardening style did rise in the 18th century and then fell into the 19th century as greater “naturalism” in landscape gardening took hold. But it’s ironic to your point that some of the purists of the highly formal English gardens that preceded Brown blame him for destroying those highly formal English gardens to make way for his form of naturalism---eg the massive English “park” (parkland estate) that were most of his commissions. A style of landscape design, by the way, that did evolve from the painting art often known as "the Beautiful" (in the sense of its interpretations of Nature) that emanated from the likes of artist Claude Lorrain et al.

But then Brown’s star rose again into the 20th century which is important for us on here to know, as it is the century, by the way, where most of the best man-made golf architecture was designed and built and hit its peak, in both England and America, particularly inland and particularly with what has become known as the “parkland” style of golf architecture. It’s instructive for us to know that some of Brown’s “park” designs and projects are used as golf courses. Are any of Gertrude Jekyll’s projects used as golf courses?

Repton was critical of Brown occasionally but he also defended him and his work. You seem to want to make it look like he may’ve hated everything he did. One should never advance one-sided historical revisionism to make some point. A more balanced and more accurate presentation of history is necessary to understand it best.  

But, again, let’s not forget, we are a golf architecture website here. Brown’s landscape architecture designs have influenced golf course architecture tremendously, particularly it’s “parkland” style that is of no small significance or consequence in the context of golf course architecture generally. Both England and America are replete with "parkland" style courses and have been for the last century.

You should try a bit harder to understand this and admit to it instead of constantly trying to defend your fairly unsupportable point that the "Arts and Crafts" Movement and perhaps the landscape gardeners who endorsed it are some primary influence on golf course architecture of the 20th century including the Golden Age.

TE
Out of repect for the other thread I thought I'd start a new thread.

Where did I say Repton hated everything Brown did? I never mentioned anything about Repton’s opinion of Brown. Not knowing who-said-what may explain your confusion with this subject.

Highly formal gardens? Are you saying the A&C garden is highly formal? Perhaps you are confusing the formal gardens of the mid-Victorian period (which featured geometric carpet bedding) with the gardens of the A&C era (which featured garden rooms, hardy native species, informal herbaceous borders, woodland gardens, pergolas, water features, occasional topiary, etc.).

As I said before the A&C gardens were modeled after 15th and 16th C English gardens (Elizabethan?) and Old English Cottage gardens. The formal Victorian gardens had their roots in Europe, Italy I believe. Apples and oranges.

Yes, there was at least one golf course in a Jekyll garden – Windelsham Moor – it was designed by Fowler & Simpson. Tom Simpson also created golf courses in the gardens at Knightshayes Court, Hill Hall and Crowborough….it was a specialty of his. I take it you haven’t read Wethered & Simpson’s ‘Architectural Side of Golf’ and the chapter In An English Garden.

And of course you also have Jekyll gardens adjacent to Muirfield (Alfred Lyttelton), Walton Heath (Herbert Fowler) and Royal Ashdown Forest (Horace Hutchinson).

You know a lot more about Capability Brown than I do. When exactly in the 20th C did Brown’s star rise again and who was responsible for it rising at that time?

[john_stiles]

Let's have it so I can learn a lot today.

[TEPaul]

"Where did I say Repton hated everything Brown did? I never mentioned anything about Repton’s opinion of Brown. Not knowing who-said-what may explain your confusion with this subject."

Tom:

My mistake, you didn't say that at all. What you did say is this;

“TE
The garden designers of the late 19th and early 20th C hated Capability Brown.”

That very well may’ve been but my point here is so what? What does that have to do with landscape architecture’s basic impact on golf course architecture?

What we are trying to do here, or at least I thought we were trying to do, is have a discussion about golf course architecture and what it was that had some significant effects and influences on golf course architecture from other disciplines or art forms such as landscape gardening, landscape design and landscape architecture.

I mean in some way it is fascinating to listen to you drone on and drop all kinds of names and places about the A/C Movement, about the “wild gardens” of Jekyll and others, and so forth---about how the proponents of that style hated Capability Brown because his style was still too formal, too unnatural, but the point is what was it that had a real effect on golf course architecture?

Again, your contention in your five part essay on the Arts and Crafts movement is that it had a huge influence on GCA and its Golden Age architecture, even if through practitioners of other disciplines such as late 19th century landscape gardeners such as Gertrude Jekyl who may’ve supported the A/C Movement.

In my opinion, that is just basically historically and factually unsupportable. At least it certainly is to the extent that you’re proposing it, which is to actually suppose it had such a massive influence on GCA that the Golden Age of architecture should more appropriately be termed “Arts and Crafts Golf” (A/C golf architecture)---eg the title, and the point of your five part essay.

You said just above;

“Highly formal gardens? Are you saying the A&C garden is highly formal? Perhaps you are confusing the formal gardens of the mid-Victorian period (which featured geometric carpet bedding) with the gardens of the A&C era (which featured garden rooms, hardy native species, informal herbaceous borders, woodland gardens, pergolas, water features, occasional topiary, etc.).”

Tom, why don’t you try reading a bit more diligently sometimes and you may not need to ask questions like that all the time? Why do you think I’m saying the A/C gardens were highly formal? Did the A/C garden style PRECEDE Capability Brown? Of course not, he preceded the A/C Movement and the English "wild garden" LA style of a Jekyll et al by at least 50-100 years.

Furthermore, was Gertrude Jekyll's style of landcape gardening actually ever called "The Arts and Crafts style of landscape gardening" by anyone at that time? Or is that just some term you came up with to more effectively connected these largely unconnected art forms, disciplines and movements simply to continue making your point of how influential the William Morris and the AC Movement was on golf course architecture?

I said that some purists and proponents of the classical and highly formal English Garden style that preceded Brown blamed him for reordering many of those gardens into his more natural and pastoral landscaped “park’ style.

[TEPaul]

"You know a lot more about Capability Brown than I do. When exactly in the 20th C did Brown’s star rise again and who was responsible for it rising at that time?"

I do? That's too bad. Perhaps you should try to learn a bit more about him, instead of apparenlty staying so fixated on one era and one style. That type of thing tends to make people who consider history a bit one-dimensional. You know what I mean by that Tom MacW?

In the overall Lancelot Capability Brown just might be considered the greatest English landscape designer of them all---despite your total fixation with the likes of Getrude Jekyll et al, and William Morris and the Arts and Crafts Movement. I realize you like that movement but in the grand scheme of things that movement even in it own time was not the only one, the only style or the only popular style of its time by any measure. You should perhaps appreciate that a bit more, as well.  

Anyway, Marie Louise Gothein began his reputation's restoration and contributed to the rise of Brown's star again in 1913 and with the book she wrote in the 1920s on the history of European gardens. Another who contributed to his rising star was Christopher Hussey, and there were others.

From a source on Brown and the history of garden design you may want to (Belay that--you may NEED to) consider the following as it may apply to Capability Brown's style and that of Jekyll and her more natualized "wild garden" style;

"The astonishing change in the appreciation of Brown as a landscape designer is a consequence of the development of garden history as a serious subject. It became evident that he was a stylist, and that the nature which he sought to imitate was not the wild nature of briars, brambles and the Lake District. His love was for that gentler nature which characterises the English lowlands; for serpentine and smoothly flowing curves. Serpentine curves can be conceived to occupy an intermediate position in the Neoplatonic hierarchy. They are not as perfect as the circle and square but they have more generality than the random patterns and jagged lines which characterise wild forests and mountains."

[T_MacWood]

That very well may’ve been but my point here is so what? What does that have to do with landscape architecture’s basic impact on golf course architecture?

What we are trying to do here, or at least I thought we were trying to do, is have a discussion about golf course architecture and what it was that had some significant effects and influences on golf course architecture from other disciplines or art forms such as landscape gardening, landscape design and landscape architecture.

TE
The point is if you are going to discover what were the influences on golf architecture (at the turn of the century) you must understand what was going in the part of the world at that time. What was popular (Jekyll, Old England, vernacualr traditions) and what was not popular (Brown, Victorian gardens, Victorian aesthetics).

I mean in some way it is fascinating to listen to you drone on and drop all kinds of names and places about the A/C Movement, about the “wild gardens” of Jekyll and others, and so forth---about how the proponents of that style hated Capability Brown because his style was still too formal, too unnatural, but the point is what was it that had a real effect on golf course architecture?

It had an effect on all the arts. It was a period when the public desired old, traditional, vernacular, honest, designs...be they architecture, garden, music, furniture, art, theater or golf courses.

Tom, why don’t you try reading a bit more diligently sometimes and you may not need to ask questions like that all the time? Why do you think I’m saying the A/C gardens were highly formal? Did the A/C garden style PRECEDE Capability Brown? Of course not, he preceded the A/C Movement and the English "wild garden" LA style of a Jekyll et al by at least 50-100 years.

I said that purists and proponents of the classical and highly formal English Garden style that preceded Brown blamed him for reordering many of those gardens into his more natural and pastoral landscaped “park’ style.

I've actually read quite a bit about the subject; I've even taken a course or two on the history of LArch. It is my understanding the formal gardens that Brown destroyed predate him by one or two hundred years...those who built them were long gone and unable to criticize him.

And I wouldn't call those gardens highly formal...highly formal were the gardens of France and Italy. The English gardens of the 15th and 16th C were comparatively less formal, many evolved over a period of years and were more haphazard or irregular. They were also more practical & less decorative, often featuring a kitchen garden, a bowling green, etc.

Brown was criticzed by those who came after him (Price, Repton) for the destruction of many tradtional old gardens. Those two are also part of the English Landscape School. He was also criticized by the A&C garden makers (for the same thing 100+ years later); they were trying to revive those traditional gardens.

Anyway, Marie Gothein apparently helped contribute to the rise of Brown's star in 1913 and with the book she wrote in the 1920s on the history of European gardens. Another who contributed to his rising star was Christopher Hussey.

Did you get that off the Internet? Gothein's book was published in English in 1928 and Christopher Hussey's (who incidently wrote for Country Life) book on the Picturesque was published in 1927. Isn't it difficult to imagine these books having an influence upon golf architecture at the turn of the century?

[TEPaul]

Tom MacWood:

I added to my post above after you apparently posted your last one.

[Mike_Cirba]

I'm not much of a betting man but I'd probably have to bet on a guy named "Capability" in this seeming mismatch.  

Let's say Brown in 4 rounds, even giving up the weight advantage.  

[T_MacWood]

No contest...she'd beat him to within inch of his life and then sit on him.

TE
Thats wonderful that you think he was the greatest LArchitect of all time. At the time in question (the turn of the century) in your own words his star had faded and had been faded for sometime...that is until as you explained his star was revived...in the late 20s.

What was in vogue at that time were A&C aesthetics.

[ForkaB]

Thanks, Mike

I'll go for Gertrude, because of the stick.

If they ever realy got it on, Steve King could write a book about their spawn......

[TEPaul]

"TE
The point is if you are going to discover what were the influences on golf architecture (at the turn of the century) you must understand what was going in the part of the world at that time. What was popular (Jekyll, Old England, vernacualr traditions) and what was not popular (Brown, Victorian gardens, Victorian aesthetics)."

Tom MacWood:

That remark of yours is definitely the very best yet that completely proves not only how far off the mark you can get but precisely why.

The type of landscape gardening or landscape design you seem to like and be completely fixated on was not the only one or the only style or type of its time in the latter half of the Victoria Age and it was most certainly not the only one that was popular.

There was far more going on in every facet of life--eg economic thinking, philosophy, politics, art and science than perhaps at any other time that came before it. The Victorian Era itself, despite the odd misperception of apparently so many of us today that it was a time of some unusual stultification in fashion or dress or emotions was anything but that in a general sense. It just may've been the most dynamic of times in all those areas of any time that came before it. Victoria herself may've been stulified in various ways but her general era most certainly wasn't.

For some reason you seem to think that in the areas to which the A/C movement had to do, or in the area of landscaping and landscape gardening, the style you seem to like was the only one or the only one that was popular. I tried to explain that too you with various examples about six months ago but that obviously didn't take or it went right over your head again.

It was popular with its proponents, of course, as most all styles obviously are, but its proponents were by no manner or means all of the Victorian Age's opinion.

It's pretty shocking to truly see how one dimensionally minded you are in this way. You seem to think that because you might admire something, some style, some movement from some age that that was all there was at that time, or that that was the only thing that was popular then. Anything but, Im sorry to inform you.

Don't tell me again what more I need to know or read about landscape gardening, the A/C Movement or golf course architecture and the influences on it at any particular time.

What you need to do before proceeding one more step with this A/C Movement and landscape gardening/landscape architecture or golf architecture is to familiarize yourself a whole lot better with that era we know as the Victorian Age.

I suggest you go to a website by the name of the "VictorianWeb" and read the whole damn thing. And for God's sake try not to tell me that those people who write the articles and essays on it don't know what they're talking about and that only you do.

After you've done that if your opinions on some of these things, the styles, the tastes, the movements and currents of opinion, are the same as they are now, well, then, I'd pretty much give up on you as others no doubt should too.

You call yourself an historian? Any decent historian on any subject of any era or age pretty much needs to take their head out of affixing it into some single little cubbyhole of one movement, as you're apparently doing, and look around and look at what else was going on around it.

Try that and hopefully even you will become a little less one dimensionally minded on even these few subjects and issues.

[Jeff_Brauer]

I remember these two as important figures from my landscape architecture classes.  Either Tom can correct me, but CB's contribution to landscape design was the "ha ha" of which this thread has few.......


Given their importance, and my interest in history, I should be riveted by this thread.......and yet..........

[TEPaul]

"Gothein's book was published in English in 1928 and Christopher Hussey's (who incidently wrote for Country Life) book on the Picturesque was published in 1927. Isn't it difficult to imagine these books having an influence upon golf architecture at the turn of the century?"

Thomas:

Is there something wrong with you these days? Are you having some kind of mental or emotional problems? I ask because it's damn near impossible attempting to have any sort of rational conversation with you. You are all over the place. You apparently don't read posts or don't understand them, constantly asking questions in response to questions.

I never said a word about Gothien or Hussey having any influence on golf course architecture. You asked me who was first responsible in the 20th century for praising the work of Capability Brown again and I told you that. Gothein was German who wrote what's considered to be a seminal history of garden design. Hussey was from Scotney Castle and wrote of his perssonal experiences with landscape gardening.

The point is Capability Brown was largely responsible for the English "park" (parkland) landscape style, a pastoral style of country landscape architecture. From that style came what we know as the "parkland" style golf course that has been a principle part of golf course architecture for probably close to a century. That style in golf architecture hardly needed the help of Gothein and Hussey, two landscape architecture history writers with probably zero to do with golf course architecture, to be popular in golf architecture at the beginning, middle or end of the 20th century, even if that's never occured to you for some odd reason.

[TEPaul]

"TE
Thats wonderful that you think he was the greatest LArchitect of all time."

Once again, you just muddle up everything. I never said I thought Brown was the greatest English landscape designer ever---I said he may be considered to be that. Again, a patently obvious distinction is completely lost with you. You actually claim to know something about the history of landscape architecture? If so why did you have to ask me if Brown's work has been praised in the 20th century and by whom?

[TEPaul]

"Either Tom can correct me, but CB's contribution to landscape design was the "ha ha" of which this thread has few......."

No Jeff, I'm quite sure CB did not contribute the idea or the "HaHa" to landscape design, although it very well may've been a landscape designer such as Lancelot "Capability" Brown in the 18th century. The function of the English HaHA was to create a seamless and unobstructed viewscape over huge amounts of pastoral land. The HaHA was essentially a diminishing line at the end of a long expanse of lawn etc. The idea was that something like a fence or wall did not break up a long viewscape and that cattle, sheep etc looked like they could walk up on the lawn but they couldn't because the HaHA (a one-sided wall or two sided trench walls) hidden from view prevented them from doing that.

I'll give you two and a half guesses what the likely etymology of the word HaHA is.  

[T_MacWood]

"TE
The point is if you are going to discover what were the influences on golf architecture (at the turn of the century) you must understand what was going in the part of the world at that time. What was popular (Jekyll, Old England, vernacualr traditions) and what was not popular (Brown, Victorian gardens, Victorian aesthetics)."

Tom MacWood:

That remark of yours is definitely the very best yet that completely proves not only how far off the mark you can get but precisely why.

The type of landscape gardening or landscape design you seem to like and be completely fixated on was not the only one or the only style or type of its time in the latter half of the Victoria Age and it was most certainly not the only one that was popular.

There was far more going on in every facet of life--eg economic thinking, philosophy, politics, art and science than perhaps at any other time that came before it. The Victorian Era itself, despite the odd misperception of apparently so many of us today that it was a time of some unusual stultification in fashion or dress or emotions was anything but that in a general sense. It just may've been the most dynamic of times in all those areas of any time that came before it. Victoria herself may've been stulified in various ways but her general era most certainly wasn't.

For some reason you seem to think that in the areas to which the A/C movement had to do, or in the area of landscaping and landscape gardening, the style you seem to like was the only one or the only one that was popular. I tried to explain that too you with various examples about six months ago but that obviously didn't take or it went right over your head again.

It was popular with its proponents, of course, as most all styles obviously are, but its proponents were by no manner or means all of the Victorian Age's opinion.

It's pretty shocking to truly see how one dimensionally minded you are in this way. You seem to think that because you might admire something, some style, some movement from some age that that was all there was at that time, or that that was the only thing that was popular then. Anything but, Im sorry to inform you.

Don't tell me again what more I need to know or read about landscape gardening, the A/C Movement or golf course architecture and the influences on it at any particular time.

What you need to do before proceeding one more step with this A/C Movement and landscape gardening/landscape architecture or golf architecture is to familiarize yourself a whole lot better with that era we know as the Victorian Age.

I suggest you go to a website by the name of the "VictorianWeb" and read the whole damn thing. And for God's sake try not to tell me that those people who write the articles and essays on it don't know what they're talking about and that only you do.

After you've done that if your opinions on some of these things, the styles, the tastes, the movements and currents of opinion, are the same as they are now, well, then, I'd pretty much give up on you as others no doubt should too.

You call yourself an historian? Any decent historian on any subject of any era or age pretty much needs to take their head out of affixing it into some single little cubbyhole of one movement, as you're apparently doing, and look around and look at what else was going on around it.

Try that and hopefully even you will become a little less one dimensionally minded on even these few subjects and issues.

TE
Once again a lot of general admonishment, but as usual not a single specific example.

If you are trully interested in discovering what was going from say 1895 to 1910 - the period in question - may I suggest you look beyond the Victorian Website. For one thing after 1870  the great Victorian boom years were over and interests began to change significantly. And the period concerned is considered more Edwardian than Victorian.

Examples of the VictorianWeb's short-comings: Little or no coverage of late 19th C architecture...no mention of Lutyens. Little or no coverage of landscape architecture and the garden city movement...no mention of Jekyll. Poor information on that periods mass media, no mention of the most popular magazine Tit-Bits and no mention of Country Life that periods most popular lifestyle magazine, no mention George Newnes or George Riddell. No mention of the flight to the country. Very little mention the 1870 Education Act and the public schools effect upon late Victorian and Edwardian culture. Very little on the pursuit of leisure and popularity of sport. No Elgar. No radio, telephone or automobile, etc etc

If I could recommend something for you to read may I suggest Sir Roy Strong's 'Spirit of Britain - A Narrative History of the Arts'. I think it may open your eyes.

[T_MacWood]

"Gothein's book was published in English in 1928 and Christopher Hussey's (who incidently wrote for Country Life) book on the Picturesque was published in 1927. Isn't it difficult to imagine these books having an influence upon golf architecture at the turn of the century?"

Thomas:

Is there something wrong with you these days? Are you having some kind of mental or emotional problems? I ask because it's damn near impossible attempting to have any sort of rational conversation with you. You are all over the place. You apparently don't read posts or don't understand them, constantly asking questions in response to questions.

I never said a word about Gothien or Hussey having any influence on golf course architecture. You asked me who was first responsible in the 20th century for praising the work of Capability Brown again and I told you that. Gothein was German who wrote what's considered to be a seminal history of garden design. Hussey was from Scotney Castle and wrote of his perssonal experiences with landscape gardening.

The point is Capability Brown was largely responsible for the English "park" (parkland) landscape style, a pastoral style of country landscape architecture. From that style came what we know as the "parkland" style golf course that has been a principle part of golf course architecture for probably close to a century. That style in golf architecture hardly needed the help of Gothein and Hussey, two landscape architecture history writers with probably zero to do with golf course architecture, to be popular in golf architecture at the beginning, middle or end of the 20th century, even if that's never occured to you for some odd reason.

TE
You give us Brown as major influence on golf architecture at the turn of century. When it is pointed out to you his star had fallen and he was an unpopular figure, you say that maybe true but his star rose again...in the late 20s! I think HG Wells wrote about a time machine during this peiod but I'm pretty sure it was fiction.

I have to give you credit you really are doing your Internet research. Have you actually read anything written by Gothein or Hussey?

I'm pretty sure Sunningdale, Huntercombe, Walton Heath, Woking etc are heathland and not parkland. Many of the often criticized Victorian designs were built in parks.

[T_MacWood]

"Either Tom can correct me, but CB's contribution to landscape design was the "ha ha" of which this thread has few......."

No Jeff, I'm quite sure CB did not contribute the idea or the "HaHa" to landscape design, although it very well may've been a landscape designer such as Lancelot "Capability" Brown in the 18th century. The function of the English HaHA was to create a seamless and unobstructed viewscape over huge amounts of pastoral land. The HaHA was essentially a diminishing line at the end of a long expanse of lawn etc. The idea was that something like a fence or wall did not break up a long viewscape and that cattle, sheep etc looked like they could walk up on the lawn but they couldn't because the HaHA (a one-sided wall or two sided trench walls) hidden from view prevented them from doing that.

I'll give you two and a half guesses what the likely etymology of the word HaHA is.  

Jeff
The Ha Ha was developed by Thomas Bridgeman...I cheated and looked in one of my old college text books.

[Ian Andrew]

I'm enjoying the thread a lot, but that's because I still remeber some of that section of Landscape architecture history. The only problem I have is I can't actually say I follow what this disagreement is actually about.

I will say that Capability Brown had a massive influence on golf architecture, but directly and indirectly by the parkland landscape that he was able to create. I don't have Colt's book in the house to check, but I thought he was mentioned by Colt directly and I know I have seen a reference in another book too.

As for Jekyll, I don't know of anyone who used plant material as well as she did. Comparing the two is like comparing an architect to a painter, both worked on different scales in different canvases looking for completely different results.

But then again, I don't think I followed the discussion in the first place. Tom you have sent me to the books to review Repton's work, so something good came out of all this.

Ian

[TEPaul]

Tom MacWood said:

"At the time in question (the turn of the century) in your own words his star had faded and had been faded for sometime...that is until as you explained his star was revived...in the late 20s.
What was in vogue at that time were A&C aesthetics."

Tom MacWood:

Uh-huh, right. Then why do you suppose the parkland golf courses in England and America became a signficant style in golf architecture? If I'm not mistaken it seems that L. Brown was responsible for the English "park" (parkland) landscape design style from which the "parkland" style of golf course architecture directly derives. But maybe you weren't aware of that.

[T_MacWood]

Ian
You brought up the Brown mention before on another thread...Colt never mentioned him. Brown is mentioned in the MacKenzie biography...that chapter is written by Dr. James Scott and Doak has mentioned on here he did not agree with his premise and I don't either.

I think what Jekyll and the rest of those involved in the A&C movement did was to inspire people to look back at better time, to a more natural way of doing things, vernacular design. Be it the cottage gardens of the past or the architecture of an old building in the Cottswolds or a manor house in Norfolk or an old naturally evolved links in Wales or Kintyre.

[TEPaul]

"TE
You give us Brown as major influence on golf architecture at the turn of century. When it is pointed out to you his star had fallen and he was an unpopular figure, you say that maybe true but his star rose again...in the late 20s! I think HG Wells wrote about a time machine during this peiod but I'm pretty sure it was fiction."

Tom MacWood:

Once again, you seem totally incapable of an intelligent discusion on the real influences on golf course architecture, because you're incapable of understanding what people say to you on here.

I never said or implied that Capability Brown was a major influence on golf course architecture.  Doing things like that (with the A/C Movement) seem to be your attempt at "positivism". What I said was that Brown's style of landscape design very likely gave golf course architecture the "parkland" style. Do you really feel you could possible deny that?

As for the major influence on golf course architecture of the golden Age I've said to you many times I feel it was the Heathland architecture which was the first good inland designs but primarily the scrutiny of the architectural world around the turn of the century of the natual model of the Scottish linksland, particularly St Andrews from which the Heathland genre took its cue. If it wasn't that way, I really can't imagine why so many of the great golf architecture books and writers of the 1920s said that was so.

This campaign you've been on to deny that history and evolution that has already been well chronicled and well written in some weak and factually and historically unsupportable attemtpt to assign that major influence on golf course architecture to the Arts and Crafts movement inspired by Morris, a man who knew nothing and probably cared nothing about golf through some tenuous connection to someone like Horace Hutchinson is simply revisionism at its finest.

Furthermore, even if you seem categorically incapable of admitting it the Victorian era, Edwardian era or what ever else you want to call the latter part of the 19th century in England was obviously not all enamored with the Arts and Crafts Movement as you think it was and say it was. Such a suggestion on your part is frankly patently just foolish.

As for the VictorianWewb, my suggestion to you would be to read it carefully and consider seriously what it says. I'm quite sure people on it and who contribute to it are considerable better informed about that entire era than you are.

Perhaps you should also realize that when various artists in various disciplines don't seem to be as well covered and as well respected as you think they should be there might be some very good historical reasons for that.  

[TEPaul]

"I will say that Capability Brown had a massive influence on golf architecture, but directly and indirectly by the parkland landscape that he was able to create. I don't have Colt's book in the house to check, but I thought he was mentioned by Colt directly and I know I have seen a reference in another book too."

Thank you, Ian. The guy seem categorically incapable of listening to anything I say on this subject but maybe he'll listen to you. But he may end up asking you what the hell you think you know about this subject. Afterall, he'll probaby say, who they hell are you other than just some golf course architect, and you too probably need to read Roy Strong before you can contribute to this subject.  

Do you notice how Tom MacWood has just completely avoided the subject of the "parkland" style in golf architecture although it's been mentioned to him many times on this thread as well as Brown's significance to it? He's just totally avoided responding about it or acknowledging it. Does that tell you something?  

[T_MacWood]

TE
I've read a lot of the VictorianWeb....I've traded many e-mails with gentleman who runs it...in fact he asked me to contribute an essay. Its a good site, but its not a good site if your interest is 1895 to 1910, which is the period were looking at.

As Brad Klein said the other day he is increasingly convinced that there was a vital connector between golf architecture and the Arts & Crafts theorists and the garden writers they influenced (Gertrude Jekyll, Vita Sackville-West, Chrisopher Lloyd, etc). Gardening was massively popular in those days...its no coincidence that many early golf architects were gardening aficinados (Colt, Fowler, Hutchinson, Maclean, etc). You'll come around some day.

[T_MacWood]

I think it could be argued that Capability Brown has been more of influencial with modern design than those of the past....after all most golf architects today have studied landscape architecture. That was not the case prior to WWII.

I'm pretty sure Huntercombe, Sunningdale, Walton Heath, Woking, Ashdown Forest, etc were not parkland.

Did the parkland design become the standard before WWII or after WWII? Many of the parkland courses we think of today were not built as parkland courses...there was an effort at some point to plant trees and make them parkland.

[TEPaul]

Tom MacWood:

Don't worry, I read what Brad Klein said on here and he definitley didn't say that the A/C Movement was a vital link to golf course architecture and certainly not the primary influence on the Golden Age of Golf Architecture that you've claimed. I talk to him not infrequently and I wouldn't call him much of a fan of the way you reason, that's for damn sure.

However, this thread of yours is entitled Re Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll. I guess by that you are trying to encourage discussion and opinion on which one of them influence golf architecture more.

Again, I think most of us are aware of the significant style of the "parkland" golf course, the "park" or parkland style of landscape architecture undeniably inspired by Capability Brown.

One could categorize Aronomink as a "parkland" style golf course, and probably Winged Foot too and many many others like them. They held the US Open at Winged Foot this year, probably a parkland style course. Have you heard of any US Opens on"Wild Garden" or "Arts and Crafts" golf courses?