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T_MacWood

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #125 on: September 14, 2006, 09:52:13 PM »

This is of course a most interesting point and very true. It appears that most of the original man-made features in the linksland themselves were remarkable rudimentary and horribly artificial looking. What for instance are we to make of those very early "sleepered" bunker faces that initially appeared on many of the Scottish linksland courses around the very first scratchings of man-made architecture?

Form follows function?

But now and again it appears they could show their talent if the occassion arose. For instance, Alan Robertson came up with a pretty interesting Road Hole green and Road Hole bunker which some purport may've been the first man-made architectural features ever done. And OTM must've just outdid himself when he created the 18th green at TOC.

I'll take your word for it...the history of St.Andrews and who did what is very confusing.

One needs to appreciate just how rudimentary things were back then.

But the question is whatever could William Morris, the A/C movement, Horace Hutchins or any of the rest of all those grand A/C proponents who you say were all huddling around London or Country Life Magazine or whatever have ACTUALLY done to inform Willie Park Jr to design and make what he did at Sunningdale or Huntercombe in the healthlands.

Its an interesting question...all I know is the media and popular culture often has an effect on design....sometimes profound effect.

I'm certain Jekyll, Lutyens, MacKenzie and Darwin were all very thankful to Country Life.


Do you think maybe he took old Gerty Jekyll to bed and charmed her into showing him how to build a really natural bunker or green or something?  ;)

To my knowledge Willie Park was happily married and blessed with very good vision. Based on that my answer would be no.

I'd just like to see you make some direct connections, the way I have, if you are ever going to make your point about any kind of powerful influence from the A/C movement on GCA and the Golden Age.

Direct connections? Quoting C&W?
 
« Last Edit: September 14, 2006, 09:53:14 PM by Tom MacWood »

TEPaul

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #126 on: September 14, 2006, 09:57:01 PM »
"Something or someone influenced Park and the others to design (and redesign) courses in a new way. These men were not opperating in a vacuum."

I'm not sure why it is you keep saying that but you sure do.

Why do you suppose it's so hard for you to understand that it could be something as logical as a Park had simply not found the right place, the right resources and the necessary time to pull it off previously? Probably the same happened with Macdonald in Long Island. What he laid out in Chicago previous to NGLA sure wasn't much. I just can't understand why if it happened that way you seem to think they were oprerating in some vacuum previously just waiting for some ethereal globe spanning "philosophy" that didn't have anything to do with golf architecture to come along and teach them what they needed to do to finally create some great architecture.

Maybe that's precisely YOUR PROBLEM. You just can't understand how something like that can happen to men of talent---eg there comes a time and a place where they're able to show it. That doesn't mean they were in some vacuum. But I guess you just don't get that and that's why you go searching for these theories of yours like this A/C Movment being a powerful influence on golf architecture. What you do really is like spaghetti throwing against a wall. Because you can't understand that they can do it on their own you have to throw some extraneous theory or "philosophy" at them and what they did.  ;)
« Last Edit: September 14, 2006, 10:01:29 PM by TEPaul »

TEPaul

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #127 on: September 14, 2006, 09:59:28 PM »
"Direct connections? Quoting C&W?"

No Tom MacWood, not quoting C&W. I'm talking about C&W's analysis of the history and evolution of golf architecture. Perhaps you don't even know the difference.

T_MacWood

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #128 on: September 14, 2006, 09:59:40 PM »
Tom MacWood:

Those two last posts of yours aren't even worth responding to anymore. All the questions (and problems you cited) were answered in my previous five or so posts. All the answers to those quesitions are right there but you just ignore them and keep asking the same questions over and over again. Just reread my last five or so posts and if you can't understand those answers I can't do much more to help you.

Do us all a favor and read the first 23 to 33 pages of Cornish and Whitten's "The Architects of Golf" and then tell us all why or how their explanations about this subject are wrong or even misleading.

I'll tell you the primary reason they aren't wrong. It's because they don't attempt to ply revisionist history theories like you do with this A/C Movement influence stretch of yours.

All you've really done here is to try to float one of the themes of a movement you're fixated on for a particular reason that doesn't have much of anything to do with the evolution of golf architecture at that time---eg preservation and prevention of improper restoration----in the hopes that someone will believe you. I guess you thought you might make some kind of name for yourself as a golf archtiecture historian that way.

What you've done is sort of like throwing spaghetti against the wall to see if it will stick. It really is positivism----eg dream up some conclusion and then try to find facts and reasons to support it, while refusing to even listen to the accurate explanations of the true facts and analyses of what really did happen and why from golf architecture's previously recorded literature.

What Park pulled off in the heathland in 1900 and why probably isn't much different from what Macdonald pulled off on Long Island in 1907 and why---eg they got tired of looking at the crap that preceded what they did in 1900 and 1907 so those were the times and the places they decided to do something about it. Did Macdonald decide to go to London and hang around those A/C people you keep promoting for golf architectural inspiration? No, he went back to Scotland and copied some holes and some concepts from them and brought them back and built them in America. Crump and Wilson did the same thing from the linksland and the heathlands.

Every day on here reading some of the stuff you come up with makes me wonder what those guys you're writing about would think if they could read it. They'd probably laugh their asses off. I, on the other hand, try to rely on what they actually they did and said and wrote. It seems like you've tried to tell us you know now what they were thinking about and why better than they did back then.

It's unbelievable---funny really, but in my book it all boils down to some unfortunate revisionism of a valuable history and evolution.

I agree...you would probably be wise not to respond. We appear to me talking about two different subjects....you, what you've gleaned from C&W and me, what I've gathered from C&W and independent research.

As I've said many times before, we have only scratched the surface of what is out there.

TEPaul

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #129 on: September 14, 2006, 10:10:54 PM »
"I agree...you would probably be wise not to respond. We appear to me talking about two different subjects....you, what you've gleaned from C&W and me, what I've gathered from C&W and independent research."

Oh, so now you're back to you and your independent research, and eveyone else is in some benighted world of an information void. Just how insecure are you, Tom, to keep saying things like that on here?

"As I've said many times before, we have only scratched the surface of what is out there."

How convenient for your continued spaghetti throwing of theories and "philosophies ;) against the wall. It wouldn't surprise me at all if much of the information has been collected and the analyses of it all has been quite well written and presented. But maybe you think that doesn't leave much room for you. Perhaps you should begin to get into the way you once said you think history should be presented---eg in a number of iterations of "What ifs?"    ;)

For my part, I'll forego those excercises. I'd rather just find out what really happened and why.  ;)
« Last Edit: September 14, 2006, 10:12:55 PM by TEPaul »

T_MacWood

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #130 on: September 14, 2006, 10:29:44 PM »
"Something or someone influenced Park and the others to design (and redesign) courses in a new way. These men were not opperating in a vacuum."

I'm not sure why it is you keep saying that but you sure do.

Why do you suppose it's so hard for you to understand that it could be something as logical as a Park had simply not found the right place, the right resources and the necessary time to pull it off previously? Probably the same happened with Macdonald in Long Island. What he laid out in Chicago previous to NGLA sure wasn't much. I just can't understand why if it happened that way you seem to think they were oprerating in some vacuum previously just waiting for some ethereal globe spanning "philosophy" that didn't have anything to do with golf architecture to come along and teach them what they needed to do to finally create some great architecture.

Interesting conjecture...he simply found the right place. Twice. And two very different places.

Maybe that's precisely YOUR PROBLEM. You just can't understand how something like that can happen to men of talent---eg there comes a time and a place where they're able to show it. That doesn't mean they were in some vacuum. But I guess you just don't get that and that's why you go searching for these theories of yours like this A/C Movment being a powerful influence on golf architecture. What you do really is like spaghetti throwing against a wall. Because you can't understand that they can do it on their own you have to throw some extraneous theory or "philosophy" at them and what they did.  ;)

Do you opperate in vacuum?

« Last Edit: September 14, 2006, 10:30:17 PM by Tom MacWood »

T_MacWood

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #131 on: September 14, 2006, 10:31:52 PM »
"Direct connections? Quoting C&W?"

No Tom MacWood, not quoting C&W. I'm talking about C&W's analysis of the history and evolution of golf architecture. Perhaps you don't even know the difference.


I'm not under the impression you have conducted any independent research beyond C&W.

ForkaB

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #132 on: September 15, 2006, 05:32:20 AM »
Vis a vis the steeplechase theory, I caught a glimpse of the Burghley Horse Trials a couple of weeks ago and noted:

1.  The land/garden they were competing over looked as if it could be the basis of a really fine golf course
2.  It was designed by Capability Brown

Vis a vis Oor Willie (Park, Jr.), as I've said before, the one obvious flaw in the "Willie got religion when he moved to London ~1900 and met Gertrude Jeykll" theory is Burntisland GC in Scotland, which he laid out in 1896, and which exists today in fairly pristine form.  It is not a great golf course by any means (of course neither, apparently, is Huntercombe, nor probably was Sunningdale--before Colt revised it), but it is good solid golf, with some very interesting holes and a number of great natural greens.  No cop bunkers or other blatantly artificial hazards to be seen, even forensically.

Maybe it was Willie who influenced the A&C movement and not vice versa? :o

TEPaul

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #133 on: September 15, 2006, 09:00:50 AM »
Rich:

What you saw at Burghley Trials is additional support for a connection between Capability Brown's landscape design style and golf course architecture as it migrated out of Scotland into inland sites first in England in the latter half of the 19th century.

But we need to then look at what that connection was directly. In other words what are the actual similarities between a Capability Brown landscape designed "park" or parkland estate and an inland golf course in England on one of those Brown "parks", for instance?

To understand that we need to reiterate what golf course architecture actually is. We need to always remember well what the component parts of golf architecture are, in other words.

We know that the first component part of golf architecture involves "routing" a course. In the old days they may've referred to that semi-separate process as "laying-out" a course. That involves just staking starting points for holes, tees, the basic direction of a hole and an ending point, the green. When that has been done eighteen times how those separate eighteen entities appear and particularly how they relate to one another on land is a "routing" or an old fashioned "lay-out".

At that point an architect can actually walk away having contributed to the first essential component of golf architecture, and a number of the original architects in Victorian England in the latter part of the 19th century probably did walk away at that point having been paid for just that service.

But then, for lack of a better term, I've called the second basic component part of golf course architecture the "designng up" phase. In this stage various necessary features, if they do not exist naturally, are added to that basic routing or layout---eg man-made teeing areas, man-made fairway sizes and shapes, particularly man-made obstacle feature arrangements and shapes and sizes such as pits, mounds, berms, bunkering etc and green shapes and sizes and desgins, if none naturally exist.

We can see that golf courses can have a little of that "designing up" phase or a lot of it. We also know, if we think about it (which obviously some and some on here don't ;) ) that an architect could probably create in that "designing up" phase a dozen or more courses that look remarkably different from one another and play remarkably different from one another, and, again, all on the exact same "routing" design or "layout".

Now, what was it that Capability Brown offered directly to the art of golf course architecture that it used in more than an insignificant number of cases to evolve and perfect itself to some extent?

We know that the massively landscaped "parks" that Brown did on some of the enourmous English estates of 18th century England offered sites on which golf architectural "ROUTINGS" could be utilized in ways that had not been used before in the art of architecture which at that time (in the 1860s, 1870s, 1880s and 1890s) was the beginning of the art of golf architecture itself. We should also note that this initial golf architecture followed Capability Brown's life and career in landscape architecture by almost a century.

What was different about Brown's landscape architecture style from the man-made styles of landscape architecture that preceded him and apparently made him one of the most significant landscape architects in English landscape architecture history?

He basically utilized flowing and curving lines with features such as curved man-made lakes, hills (sometimes man-made) and such and somewhat random arrangements of trees amongst open space (vistas), also man-made.

This was a something of a massive departure from the English landscape styles that preceded him which were baroque, or geometric lines of classical Greek and Roman landscape styles (Augustan) sometimes referred to as "neo-classical.

Brown's basic style was such a departure it took on its own name for which he is given almost sole credit. It came to be known as "Serpentine". Essentially that was Capability Brown's basic landscape architectural style.

But we can easily see by looking at drawings of Brown's landscape architecture that frequent serpentine characteristic---eg long flowing curved lines. We can also see if we look at the drawings of golf courses and their component hole forms that were to come many years later  many of them also utitilize those serpentine curves and formations characteristic of Brown's unique style.

So, some of the first early golf course used his "park" or parkland sites for their routings and those routings became more sophisiticated because of it, more naturally appearing in an over-all "layout" sense. And perhaps most important of all we need to recognize that the size and scale of Brown's designs and "parks" were large enough in fact to put the entire routing of a golf course seamlessly into it or on it. I would very much doubt that this was ever true of something like a Gertrude Jekyll style English cottage garden or that landscape style that would follow Brown by another century again.

But what about some of the "designing up" characteristics of most of those "Victorian" age early courses on many of those original "park" sites of Capability Brown that really were quite natural in their overall arrangements and "lines" and formations?

We can see that many of them had individual architectural features, particularly pits and mounds and berms and bunkers, that were remarkably artifiicial, geomtric and man-made looking---basically the opposite of Nature itself?

(Setting aside for a moment, the differences between the necessities of the merely "aesthetic" and the necessities of  "sport" man appears to have borrowed a type and style of obstacle feature on early golf courses in particularly inland England in this early age of golf architecure that were readily available to him and understandable. Enter the world of the horse and the recreational sport component of the world of the horse---eg such as steeplechasing which is not hard to tell now was prevalent and readily available to these early golfers and architects in inland England. I'll get back to this in another thread. ;)

Why was that? Why might man inherently tend to make things geometrically? Probably because man inherently tends to make things that are precisely arranged and defined as they had in Greece and Roman a millenium before, and in English landscaping a century or so before Brown. Obviously man must feel this is showing his precision---his ability to be precise and defined. And obviously he must feel this puts him apart from Nature itself, perhaps even apart so as to be even better than Nature which he traditionally observed as random helter-skelter, sometimes dangerous and threatening and more than a little unexplainable.

Enter "God" who morphed out of the previous world of the mythologies of Nature itself as an invented method of explaining the unexplanable characteristics of the natural world around us.

Then enter the Age of Reason when man began to order and categorize all that he observed of Nature to more fully understand it and what it meant to him, how he might more understandably co-exist with it.

Enter from this age of Reason the concepts of the "Sublme" and then the "Beautiful" and then the "Picturesque".

These were essentially "ideas" that were evolving as man attempted to deal with nature around him, and then to a much larger extent to appreciate the beauty of Nature in its randomness.

In the beginning of golf architecture outside the beautiful natural formations of the land of the linksland (not man-made) on sites that were in most every way unsuited to natural golf (in look, soil structure and natural features) perhaps very few, if any, even realized how important the natural formations of nature really were to golf itself. This realization probably and logically took some time (as Sean Arble said perhaps 10-25 years or more). Over a few decades they obviously came to realize that these types of artifiical, geometric Victorian formations only offered a "penal" characteristic to the playing of the game and not the "strategic" characteristic of natural linksland unaltered by man (pre-golf course architecture).

And so in the component of golf architecture I call the "designing Up" phase they began to cast their eyes and minds back to the only thing that existed for golf before man-made architecture existed---the natural formations of the linksland.

And at that point they began to try to mimic it in every way and component of golf architecture---in the "routing" component and in the "designing up" component.

And the first evidence of it appeared inland in the English heathlands by Park. And the Golden Age of golf course architecture, particulary on inland sites around the world, began.

Hopefully, this will more clearly show how and why this "new beginning" of more natural man-made golf architecture in all its components that originated for the first time on inland sites in the heathlands was basically just a logical evolution and progression out of what had come before it---eg the first migration of golf out of Scotland and what was done for a few decades following that, which combined to create an increased awareness (because of the lack of quality of that early era) of the importance of golf's natural component which was the early linksland courses pre-man-made architecture.


 

« Last Edit: September 15, 2006, 10:27:40 AM by TEPaul »

T_MacWood

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #134 on: September 15, 2006, 09:22:42 AM »
Sean
I pretty much agree with your assessment. I don't believe events occur just by happenstance. As I said on one of the first pages of this thread I think you can make the case for many factors or influences when trying to unravel what happened in 1900.

From the influence of the A&C movement and its revival mentality to the widening of the old course to the English Landscape school (to a lesser degree) to the popular writing of Jekyll and her cronies.

Here is an example of events conspiring which ultimately effected gca:
 
* In the late Victorian era there was a growing disgust for city life...industialization, polution, overcrowding, crime etc.

* Largely due to the ideas promoted by A&C leaders a rural ideal or aesthetic became popular...the idea of going back to a simpler way of life, a British arcadian aesthetic, which included vernacular architecture, vernacular gardens, hand-made objects, fresh air, out-door pursuits, sport, etc, etc.

* Consequently there was major exodus in the countryside...into the home counties.

* Magazines like Country Life which promoted this new country lifestyle/ideal became very popular

* Economics, transportation and the media were all involved in the movement.

* Due to England's damp climate when searching for land to develop these new A&C/vernacular inspired communites the most important consideration was well drained soil  

* New upscale development exploded in sandy pockets throughout Surrey and Sussex.

*....with these new houses and new developments (and influx of capital) came golf courses on these sandy lands

* These sandy golf courses were designed by men who shared the culture's vernacular and eclectic attitude, and that attitude translated into vernacular inspired-free style designs no matter what the soil type or conditions
« Last Edit: September 15, 2006, 01:18:45 PM by Tom MacWood »

T_MacWood

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #135 on: September 15, 2006, 09:26:34 AM »
Vis a vis the steeplechase theory, I caught a glimpse of the Burghley Horse Trials a couple of weeks ago and noted:

1.  The land/garden they were competing over looked as if it could be the basis of a really fine golf course
2.  It was designed by Capability Brown

Vis a vis Oor Willie (Park, Jr.), as I've said before, the one obvious flaw in the "Willie got religion when he moved to London ~1900 and met Gertrude Jeykll" theory is Burntisland GC in Scotland, which he laid out in 1896, and which exists today in fairly pristine form.  It is not a great golf course by any means (of course neither, apparently, is Huntercombe, nor probably was Sunningdale--before Colt revised it), but it is good solid golf, with some very interesting holes and a number of great natural greens.  No cop bunkers or other blatantly artificial hazards to be seen, even forensically.

Maybe it was Willie who influenced the A&C movement and not vice versa? :o

Rich
If you will recall we explored your Burntisland Epicenter of the Transfiguration theory before. We learned that Willie didn't really hold it in high esteem on his own advertisement portfolio, and we concluded that the course had undergone more changes than you were aware of over the years.

I think one of the reasons Huntercombe and Sunningdale were so highly aclaimed had a lot to do with their scale.

TEPaul

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #136 on: September 15, 2006, 12:04:30 PM »
I'd think a very good road to go down to understand many of the reasons or influences why golf architecture inland and outside Scotland changed and even when it did would be to study carefully this whole idea that golf other than in the Scottish linksland really wasn't golf. Find out where that started and where it was strongest and how prevalent it became at any particular place and at any point in time and one might find some very influential reasons why golf architecture began to change back towards more of an architectural model of the linksland or naturalism after the few decades of its initial migration out of Scotland.

I'd bet one would see a lot of mention of wind, natural ground and natural features for golf, better drainage and agronomic conditions and more interesting play etc

It generally focused on the God given natual assets of the linksland which inland sites in the Victorian era were not considered to have. Essentially that prevalent sentiment concentrated on the linksland model and I would bet a lot there would not be a single mention in any of that opinion, at any time or any place, of the influence or even the fact of the Arts and Crafts Movement centered in and around London, England.
« Last Edit: September 15, 2006, 12:22:05 PM by TEPaul »

ForkaB

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #137 on: September 15, 2006, 12:14:35 PM »
Vis a vis the steeplechase theory, I caught a glimpse of the Burghley Horse Trials a couple of weeks ago and noted:

1.  The land/garden they were competing over looked as if it could be the basis of a really fine golf course
2.  It was designed by Capability Brown

Vis a vis Oor Willie (Park, Jr.), as I've said before, the one obvious flaw in the "Willie got religion when he moved to London ~1900 and met Gertrude Jeykll" theory is Burntisland GC in Scotland, which he laid out in 1896, and which exists today in fairly pristine form.  It is not a great golf course by any means (of course neither, apparently, is Huntercombe, nor probably was Sunningdale--before Colt revised it), but it is good solid golf, with some very interesting holes and a number of great natural greens.  No cop bunkers or other blatantly artificial hazards to be seen, even forensically.

Maybe it was Willie who influenced the A&C movement and not vice versa? :o

Rich
If you will recall we explored your Burntisland Epicenter of the Transfiguration theory before. We learned that Willie didn't really hold it in high esteem on his own advertisement portfolio, and we concluded that the course had undergone more changes than you were aware of over the years.

I think one of the reasons Huntercombe and Sunningdale were so highly aclaimed had a lot to do with their scale.

Wrong, Tom

You have added nothing to the Burntisland facts that I passed on several years ago, coming straight from their 200 year anniversay book.  Do you actually know anything about Burntisland outside what I have told you and you have read in Willie Park's advertisements? :o

Vis a vis "scale," what exactly do you mean?  Were Willie's 1901 courses significantly larger than say Sandwich or the Old or New Course?  Herbert Warren Wind would seem to have disagreed. ;)

TEPaul

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #138 on: September 15, 2006, 12:26:42 PM »
"I think one of the reasons Huntercombe and Sunningdale were so highly aclaimed had a lot to do with their scale".

Tom MacWood:

I'd say that's probably true. The overall scales and sizes of Sunningdale and Huntercombe weren't much of anything like the scale of a Gertrude Jekyll "wild" English cottage garden though, were they?

They were more on the overall scale and size of a Capability Brown landscaped "park" estate with it's serpentine sytle throughout.  ;)

What could be routed in and amongst a Capability Brown landscaped "park"? Certainly an entire 18 hole golf course with plenty of room for other things.

What could be routed in and amongst a Gertrude Stein "wild" A/C cottage garden, a 26 yard par 3, maybe two of them? ;)That is if you could find your ball or even your way through the riot of its natural indigenous vegetation?

But I don't doubt that someday and somehow you'll figure out some direct connection of Gerty's A/C style to golf or golf architecture. How about as an early 20th century meditative, naturalized, arcadian, vernacular vegetable garden out behind the kitchen of the golf course's clubhouse?  ;)

I agree with you Rich, he added nothing to the Bruntisland facts a couple of years ago and he added nothing to them this time. It was pretty much his usual modicum of name dropping of a few people who probably meant little just to seem like he's done some "independent research" and you haven't. :)

I'm beginning to think that the "independent research" of Tom MacWood, at least the way he tends to interpret it, is a pretty damn scary thing for golf architecture's historical record. ;)
« Last Edit: September 15, 2006, 12:50:58 PM by TEPaul »

T_MacWood

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #139 on: September 15, 2006, 12:50:36 PM »
Rich
Perhaps your memory has failed....here is a link to that thread:

http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forums2/index.php?board=1;action=display;threadid=17013;start=0

On earlier thread you said Willie Park designed the original course in 1892 recommeding 15 holes, then Old Tom made it 18 in 1895. You said that was the reason it was so cramped.

It sounds like it has fascinating history; perhaps it would be a good subject for your next book

TE
I suspect the scale was inspired by the great vernacular links.

TEPaul

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #140 on: September 15, 2006, 12:55:49 PM »
"TE
I suspect the scale was inspired by the great vernacular links."

I see---the great VERNACULAR links!!  ;) :)

Hmmm. Who inspired that, William, Horace or Gerty, and some globe-spanning, art form-girdling, ethereal "philosophy" they were responsible for that no one thought to or dared actually name?

Or perhaps it was that great natural vernacular movement peculiar to the linkslands known as the "W/W" ("Wind and Water") movement. Or should we call that a "philosophy" too?  ;)
« Last Edit: September 15, 2006, 01:12:53 PM by TEPaul »

ForkaB

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #141 on: September 15, 2006, 03:57:46 PM »
Rich
Perhaps your memory has failed....here is a link to that thread:

http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forums2/index.php?board=1;action=display;threadid=17013;start=0

On earlier thread you said Willie Park designed the original course in 1892 recommeding 15 holes, then Old Tom made it 18 in 1895. You said that was the reason it was so cramped.

It sounds like it has fascinating history; perhaps it would be a good subject for your next book

TE
I suspect the scale was inspired by the great vernacular links.


Thanks for the link, Tom.  That was the thread where you kept calling Burntisland "Bruntsfield," and after you had finally recovered from that gaffe, added a few dubious references which contradicted the local historians.

Not your finest hour..... :'(

TEPaul

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #142 on: September 16, 2006, 11:00:55 AM »
Rich:

Interesting that you saw horse trials at Burghley House, a "park" designed by Capbility Brown.

Now that we are perhaps a century or more into the era and world of the automobile, rather than the 19th century world of the horse, I wonder how much more prevalent it was back in the latter part of the 19th century---eg the latter part of the Victorian Era, that the world of the Horse and all that the horse related to it such as steeplechasing took place on those massive estates or "parks" of Lancelot "Capability" Brown?

I'm sure you can imagine where I'm going here----eg no wonder many of those individual golf architectural features (berms with "cops" in front of them etc) that appeared on many of Brown's (and others like him) massive "park" estates looked like steeplechase obstacle features.  ;)

Please refer to the new thread "How LA may've initially effected GCA", because vis-a-vis this thread entitled by Tom MacWood "Capability Brown VERSUS Gertrude Jekyll" it looks to me like Capability around the 11th round just delivered a swift right-cross upside Gerty's rather substantial bosom and decked her.   ;)

Can you hear the A/C proponents in her corner that consist of William Morris, Horace Hutchinson and a bunch of other Country Life Magazine subscribers and Tom MacWood screaming to the referee, "HEY, LOW BLOW, ref, LOW BLOW'!

Maybe yes and maybe no, but it looks to me like Gerty Jekyll with her Arts and Crafts boxing trunks on is on the canvas and out cold while Lancelot "Capability" Brown with his "Serpentine" style boxing trunks on circles around her with his arms raised in victory.  ;)

Will she (and her A/C proponents) get the ten count?

Wait and see.

"One, Two, Three, Four".....
« Last Edit: September 16, 2006, 11:33:59 AM by TEPaul »

T_MacWood

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #143 on: September 18, 2006, 06:56:06 AM »

What Park pulled off in the heathland in 1900 and why probably isn't much different from what Macdonald pulled off on Long Island in 1907 and why---eg they got tired of looking at the crap that preceded what they did in 1900 and 1907 so those were the times and the places they decided to do something about it. Did Macdonald decide to go to London and hang around those A/C people you keep promoting for golf architectural inspiration? No, he went back to Scotland and copied some holes and some concepts from them and brought them back and built them in America. Crump and Wilson did the same thing from the linksland and the heathlands.


TE
In fact didn't Macdonald go to London to monitor the new wave of architecture? Weren't Horace Hutchinson and John Low his mentors?

The NGLA project may be the most well documented project in history...from the early stages of identifying the best holes to the the search for the proper site to the people involved. Macdonald even wrote a book. The revolution that proceeded it in London (and probably inspired it) is not as well documented.
« Last Edit: September 18, 2006, 06:56:49 AM by Tom MacWood »

paul cowley

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Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #144 on: September 18, 2006, 07:54:32 AM »
TomP....do you think that we would be correct in describing the works of Macdonald/Raynor/Banks/Langford as a Revival Period of the earlier Man Made Architecture Period that preceded them?.....at the very least in their use of geometric forms and in many instances their lack of concern with relating to the natural forms of their surroundings?

...maybe we could even venture to describe their work as the flowering or 'Golden Age' of Early Man Made Architecture. ;)

Keep up the good work vis a vis Capability.
paul cowley...golf course architect/asgca

T_MacWood

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #145 on: September 18, 2006, 08:28:49 AM »
Paul
CB Macdonald was not concerned with his architecture relating to its surroundings?

IMO the NGLA relates beautifully to its surroundings.

TEPaul

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #146 on: September 19, 2006, 10:53:28 PM »
"TE
In fact didn't Macdonald go to London to monitor the new wave of architecture?"

Tom MacW:

I'm pretty sure he did go to London, but to monitor the new wave of architecture? Probably so, but what new wave was that? Would it have been the new wave of a Sunningdale or Huntercombe by Park in the Heathlands? Probably so but what does that have to do with the A/C movement? I've maintained that the heathland courses of Sunningdale and Huntercombe occured for different sets of circumstances and from different influences and golf architecture's literature seems to supprort that.

"Weren't Horace Hutchinson and John Low his mentors?"

They may've been. I think they advised him on various things, or at least so he said. Macdonald mentioned that Hutchinson spoke with him about the Haskell ball, on the floater ball, on standardization for I&B, on how to throw pebbles on the ground and use that random arrangement as a mimic for contours on a putting green but what does that have to do with the A/c movement or its influence on GCA?

"The NGLA project may be the most well documented project in history...from the early stages of identifying the best holes to the the search for the proper site to the people involved"

Yes, NGLA may have been one of the most documented projects in history. Macdonald did identify landforms at NGLA to duplicate holes from Scotland or perhaps elsewhere or concepts from them. So what? That was obviously the influence original Scotish architecture had on him. What does any of that have to do with the A/C Movement?

"Macdonald even wrote a book."

Yes he did, "Scotland's Gift Golf". I've read it about a dozen times. He talks about many of the things that influenced him in that book. For some reason he never mentioned or eluded to the A/C movement around London or anywhere else as an influence on him or his ideas on golf course architecture.

"The revolution that proceeded it in London (and probably inspired it) is not as well documented."

The revolution in London that proceeded what---NGLA, Macdonald's book? And what revolution? The A/C revolution?

No, none of that seems to be well documented and there's probably always been a good reason for that.  ;)

TEPaul

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #147 on: September 19, 2006, 11:11:46 PM »
TomP....do you think that we would be correct in describing the works of Macdonald/Raynor/Banks/Langford as a Revival Period of the earlier Man Made Architecture Period that preceded them?.....at the very least in their use of geometric forms and in many instances their lack of concern with relating to the natural forms of their surroundings?"

Paul:

In my opinion, I wouldn't call the type and style of architecture that Macdonald/Raynor/Banks/Langford did as a Revival Period of the earlier Man Made Architecture Period that preceded them.

I would call what they did as an evolution of some of those earlier semi-geometric forms. The fact is Macdonald mimiced some of the very best holes of Scotland, France and perhaps elsewhere. Those holes and their concepts were famous and they worked well for golf. Were they natural looking or as natural looking as the architecture of Colt, Fowler, Abercrombie or particularly MacKenzie? I don't think there's any question they were not. That doesn't mean they weren't as good for golf, though----only that they were not as natural looking in a man-made architectural sense.

"...maybe we could even venture to describe their work as the flowering or 'Golden Age' of Early Man Made Architecture."

I think the best we could do is describe Macdonald et al's architecture as a result of what influenced him at that time. What primarily influenced an architect like MacKenzie such as the concept of camouflage was an entirely different concept in architecture with a vastly different effect, particularly in "look" or "aesthetics".

"Keep up the good work vis a vis Capability."

I can't see that anyone on here sees any connection to Capabilitly Brown and golf architecture that was to follow him perhaps 100-150 years later. I'm quite sure you do, but that's different. I think you inherently understand this evolution and the connection of various "art form" disciplines such as the 18th century English "park" landscape architecture of a Brown and how it would influence golf architecture to come.
« Last Edit: September 19, 2006, 11:15:06 PM by TEPaul »

T_MacWood

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #148 on: September 20, 2006, 07:04:59 AM »
TE
I was just correcting your statement. Macdonald did in fact go to London at a time when not only when there was a new wave in golf architecture but also a period when A&C aesthetics was prevasive.

And he did not just study Scottish golf holes...many of his models came from the south: Westward Ho!, Sunningdale, Brancaster, Sandwich, etc.

I'm not sure your Willie Park - Macdonald theory is a good one either. Park did not pick the site at Sunningdale, and very little is known why he chose the Huntercombe site (over 600 acres)...although we do know he planned to build a hotel and did try a housing development (which failed).

T_MacWood

Re:Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll
« Reply #149 on: September 20, 2006, 07:08:57 AM »
TE
Was the NGLA more geometric than the early versions of Sunningdale, Huntercombe, Walton Heath, Stoke Poges and the rest of the early London courses?

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