The three criteria you use when evaluating gca

[Tom Huckaby]

For judging golf course architecture?

1.  What the land was like prior to construction - the challenges to be overcome, or not.

2. How is the client - easy to deal with, meddling, cheap?

3.  Regulatory issues - easy to overcome, or difficult?

How the architect does with those three issues truly shows his skill as an architect.

Mike, the things you list show how great a GOLF COURSE is. And they also show the skill of the architect, for sure.  But without skill in these matters I list, he doesn't even get to start on the things you list.

Tom,

In YOUR evaluative process, how would you know about any of the three (3) items you listed ?

Absent that information, and armed with only the information gained from playing/studying the golf course, how would you judge the GCA ?[/color]

Patrick:

That's the point - we golfers DON'T know the answers to those questions.  But I do firmly believe that if one is to evaluate "architecture", those issues are rather paramount.  

Do you disagree with that?

Yes, I disagree, because in 99.9 % of the cases that detailed information is simply not available to the golfer.

Hence, establishing criteria that can never be met, for the purpose of evaluation, is a futile exercise.

When you think of a project, with all of its components, that takes months, if not years to complete, how would a golfer, as he completes his journey from the 1st tee to the 18th green, come to be infused with "total consciousness, knowledge and awareness" with respect to every aspect of the project ?  

One would have to be omniscient, and that ain't gonna happen anytime soon.

So, I think you have to discard your premise as impractical, and undertake the evaluative process on what your senses detect, accepting any additional, reliable information as a bonus.[/color]

And therefore the answer to me is it's silly for us golfers to even try to evaluate "architecture", and thus we should stick to evaluating "golf courses" - for which we have all the information we need, when we play them.

I think they're really one in the same.
One is the structure of the presentation, the other is the effect of the presentation, but, it's one presentation that the golfer interfaces with.[/color]

It's really very simple.

I don't think it is.

A golfer may enjoy a hole, but, he may have no idea as to why he enjoys the hole.  He may not understand what the architect crafted that makes the presentation so palatable to him.

That's a distinction that seperates those with a reasonably astute architectural eye.

That's why TEPaul needs his guide dog Coorshaw.[/color]

Patrick:  these are your answers, which are certainly fair, but completely miss the point.

My answer remains that we leave the assessment of architecture to those who DO know the answers to my questions, because they do remain very important in the assessment of the architect's skill.  Just because we as golfers can't know them does NOT diminish their importance.

So we as golfers ought to stick with what we know, and that is how a course strikes us.

Those with the better eye will still give better, more complete, and more insightful assessments.

TH

[Kirk Gill]

If you consider golf course design and construction an art, which I do, then why all these distinctions between the behind the scenes relationship with the client, the difficulty of the site, etc., and the resulting course?

Let's look at the Sistine Chapel ceiling. In evaluating it, does one first consider the difficult relationship between Michelangelo and Pope Julius II (the client)? Is it the fact that painting on a ceiling required that an elaborate scaffold be created, and that the artist had to stand in a most difficult position for hours on end? Is it the nature of fresco that one considers first, the fact that only a small part of the surface is prepared at any one time and must be painted while the surface is wet? Is the organizational design considerations that Michelangelo had to consider, the curved surfaces that required foreshortening to appear natural to the eye below? How about the fact that he had to obtain rare pigments on his own, and mix up his own paint? That approaches science, not art, yes? Or does one reject all of the above, only to marvel at the actual work itself, the writhing human figures, the iconic images, the colors, the technique? Or should I shut my mouth because all I know about it I've seen from pictures and learned from someone's writing, and can't really have an opinion since I've never really been there?

Or how about the notion that I might be able to appreciate the art itself, even from pictures. Further, that as I read more, see more, learn more, my enjoyment and knowledge are both enriched. If I were to visit the chapel, that would certainly take my interest and experience to a new level, but even without that experience I can get enjoyment out of that great work of art, and perhaps even share my opinions of it with others. Art teachers or experts might disregard my opinions, in fact my opinions might be totally wrong, something that further learning and experience might make me discover for myself, later.

So what, am I supposed to divide my appreciation for the Sistine Chapel ceiling into different parts, Making the Painting, and Enjoying the Painting? Or doesn't the enjoyment and knowlege of one enrich the other? Why separate them? In my mind, gca and the resulting course are intertwined, unable to be separated. The fact that there's a lot about the creation of a course that I don't know about just gives me more to learn about, if I want to. It doesn't make it a totally separate issue from the playing of the course.

I like the notion of a great job of architecture resulting in a crap course. I like it because it opens up the other option, a crap architectural job resulting in a GREAT course. Or is that idea, by definition, impossible? If the second idea is an impossiblity, it would make me doubt the first one.

Rant over.

So if I have to list my top three criteria, from all the choices that are out there, in judging golf course architecture, I'll go with these, even if only to learn differently, later:

1) Was a good game to be had?
2) Did something about the course, either the shots required, or the aesthetics, "grab me," and make me use a part of my brain other than the "keep your head down, etc." part?
3) Was there a whole-ness, a comprehensive quality, to the course. Did it feel like a singular experience, or was it a hodge-podge?

I'll start there.

[Tom Huckaby]

Kirk:

That was a GREAT rant!  Though I'm not sure we needed to see it twice.  

But this need not be so troubling.  I sincerely mean this as no knock on anyone.  I just do also sincerely believe that if one is to evaluate golf course architecture, one does need to know what really goes into the art - and three very important components are the three items I listed.  Obviously static "art" like the painting on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel is a wholly different matter because the things you list are typically unimportant - all that is important there is how the picture effects the viewer.

But in the creation of a golf course, the end result is paramount for sure, but that alone does NOT show the architect's skill, because the things I list do vary so widely, and are often obstacles to be overcome.  In static "art" it is not that way the vast majority of the time - typically there are no obstacles to be overcome.  Yes in the Sistine Chapel example there are the obtacles you listed - but ask yourself, as one considers the greatness of that, aren't those obstacles often mentioned?  So in an odd way you just proved my point... Although I will still say that in static art this overcoming of obstacles is the tiny exception, whereas in golf course architecture it seems to be very much the rule.

So I'd say I love your three criteria and agree with each - they are very important.  But I'd also say you are not assessing architecture, but rather the golf course.  Ask me how to best assess the quality of a golf course and I could do no better than exactly the three things you stated.

But you still haven't addressed the "architecture."

TH

[Kirk Gill]

But you still haven't addressed the "architecture."

Oh, but I have, young Skywalker !

The architecture results in a course, yes? Upon which a game is to be played, yes?

So criteria one, was a good game to be had, directly assesses the architecture of that course, since the architecture of the course was, by definition, performed to create a playing surface.

I've read the posts of many architects on this site, talking about the tricks they use to create interest or beauty or strategy on a hole, allowing me to fulfill criteria 2) - taking me out of my dogged golfing mind to another plane entirely. Yes, the nuts and bolts of the moving of earth, of the subtle uses of routing, the argument the archie had with the owner over using that bit of land for a hole when a bunch of houses were supposed to go there, all of that plays into what the architect does, but all of that is for one purpose - to give me the experience that I'm having when I play that course. It isn't separate - it's all part of the same thing, no?

And criteria 3) - the wholeness, the completeness of feeling - I can't begin to list all the variables that funnel into the creation of that, but I know it when it's been done right, and I believe that the architect knows it when he/she is doing it.

But I also believe that art is not necessarily static - see the relatively recent restoration work done on the Sistine Chapel ceiling (which created as much hoopla and disagreement as any golf course restoration might). Sure, you don't physically interact with that art form, but that doesn't mean that looking at it is all you can do to enjoy it. All the background, the kind of thing you're saying makes up the real bones of gca, is important to art, as well (read "Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling by Ross King).

Mr. H, we probably agree on this issue more than we disagree, and are just splitting hairs, but still, gca is the process by which a golf course is designed and built. In assessing the architecture, where else do you start, but on the course?

[Tom Huckaby]

Kirk:

Just change "GCA" in the topic line of this thread to "golf courses" and we have absolutely zero disagreement.

But my man Malone refuses to do so, so here we are.  

It is splitting hairs to some degree, but not to another.  I really do think it's important that we leave assessments of architecture to those who know all that goes into it, and we golfers take on assessment of golf courses.  Say what you will here, parse words all you want, make hugely stretched analogies to paintings on a wall that you want, that ain't gonna change!  Nor is my insistence that "architecture" and "golf courses" truly are two different things in terms of assessments/evaluations/judgments.

GCA is indeed the process by which a golf course is built.  You prefer to judge only the end product and leave out the obstacles to be overcome; I believe those obstacles do matter as they really do take skill to overcome... or to leave aside...

So you feel free to start with the end product and think you are assessing golf course architecture.  I'll smile knowingly... realizing you think you are, but you really are leaving out very important aspects.

TH

[Kirk Gill]

Of course I'm leaving out important aspects. Like I said though, unless you're the person who created it, you have to start with the course. Whatever else you can find, or discover, can only deepen the interest and the knowledge of what went into it. My lack of knowledge may render my assessment worthless. If that is your point, then I won't argue with it.

[Tom Huckaby]

Of course I'm leaving out important aspects. Like I said though, unless you're the person who created it, you have to start with the course. Whatever else you can find, or discover, can only deepen the interest and the knowledge of what went into it. My lack of knowledge may render my assessment worthless. If that is your point, then I won't argue with it.

With all due respect, that is my point - IF you attempt to assess "golf course architecture."  And it's not any crack at you, Kirk - it's a realization for the vast majority of us in here - those of us not in the business.  I'm right there with you in this.

I just don't have a problem with knowing my worthlessness, and prefer then to opine on things on which my opinion does have a chance of worth, and among those are what a golf course shows me, or means to me, as I play it.

So ask me to assess a golf course and I can give an informed opinion.  It still may not have much worth to others as they consider me patently full of shit, but at least it comes from all knowledge required to assess the course:  playing it (with of course the further realization that the more one plays a course, the better his base of knowledge becomes).

But ask me to assess golf course architecture and I truly am full of shit.

Why is this so hard?

TH

[Kirk Gill]

Not hard.

I will say, though, that you're being hard on yourself, in this instance, to say that you don't know shinola about architecture. You, or Pat Mucci or Tom Paul or George Pazin, or Lloyd Cole.........I learn a lot by reading what these, and many other, non-architects have to say on the subject. And then a Forrest Richardson or a Tom Doak will jump into the fray, and the plot thickens, and more knowledge and insight is to be had. I like all of it, whether it's really about architecture, or just the way the course plays, or its history, etc. Don't sell yourself short. Besides, if you're posting a bunch of stuff that's full of sh*t, folks'll know it anyway.

Which brings up the whole question of an architect's three criteria they use to determine if a gca.com poster is full'o'shinola............Or do they even need three?

[Tom Huckaby]

Oh they need far less than three!

And it's not that you, or I, or Pat, or any participant here knows NOTHING about architecture; of course we all do, to degrees.  But damn near always we cannot know that which is required to adequately assess the skill of an architect in creation of a golf course, and so my answer to that is if we cannot know these important things, what relevance do our opinions have?

What makes this especially glaring to me is that if we do stick to what we do know, our assessments and the discussions thereof can have so much greater meaning, and depth....

Oh well.  I guess this is my pet peeve about the site.  And while it may seem esoteric, pedantic, petty... if you really think about it it it strikes to the core of what this site is really all about.

TH

[John Kirk]

1. The quality of the geography for golf.  Generally more hills humps and bumps are better along with tight sandy ground and a propensity for wind.  A Shinnecock for instance has a huge natural advantage over say a great manufactured couse like the Honors in TN.
2.  The variety in the golf holes.  I like no 2 holes alike including holes playing in all 4 compass directions, variety in length of the 4-5 par 3's, green sizes within the course, uphill/downhill/sidehill, etc.
3.  Challenge and the ability to differentiate golfer's skills on and around the greens -- self explanatory.  A trait of every strong course I know even if they don't measure up on #1 or #2 above.

Thought I'd bring this back to the top.  This is a fine list here, a much more analytic process than my own "pretty and fun walk" criteria.

[mike_malone]

 Yes, John K., I liked John S's listing as well.

   I think it is almost exactly what I listed at the beginning but is a more creative way of puting it.

  Just as I think the linksland is incomparable for that type of architecture, I think the type of land is critical for the inland courses as well. I enjoy many inland courses that have  created many land features but they can't be  at the lofty level of those with significant natural movement, in my mind.