Looking for info on Merion East

[Chris Kane]

I've never been within 20,000 miles of Merion, so any opinion is entirely based on the pictures presented here:

The old-style bunkering looks sensational!  Literally like someone has just dug into the ground with a shovel, and a few hours laterended up with those rough-edged masterpieces.  It looks as though it fits the land perfectly, complementing the rest of the design.

The new, Fazio "improved" look is atrocious.  Completely contrived and plastic - rather than blending into the landscape, it is the ugly focal point.

Just my (uneducated!) two cents worth.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Chris Kane,

Did anyone ever show you a photo of a blind date, and then, you met her in person, and she looked nothing like the photo's ??   Her name could be Merion or Marion ?

Photo's can be deceiving and can be taken to reflect an unattractive perspective.

Actors and actresses usually like to have photos taken from their good side, to accentuate the positive, and hide the negative.

When photos are taken from the same elevation, distance and angle you can make a truer comparison.

[Paul Turner]

Patrick

Are you implying the phographer(s) might be biased in their photography skills?    

Do the photos look biased to your eye? i.e. unflattering to the new bunkers.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Paul Turner,

I'll let you draw your own conclusions.

I'll just say that when I physically visited Merion, it was different from what I had expected to see, based on photos and commentary presented on this site.

My visit was....... EYE OPENING  

[Mike_Cirba]

Patrick;

In another thread, you predicted that the "new" bunkers would not survive five years because of maintenance, accessibility, playability, and perhaps aesthetic reasons.

Is that so different from what all of us have said all along, or what is vividly portrayed in pictures on this site?

[rob_mauer]

Tommy,
  I could not agree with you more!! Spending 25 of my 36 years working at Merion. What has happened to this gem of a golf course is a sin.. 100 years of Natural beauty,wiped out by a few people with egos that probably wouldn't fit on the 120 acre sight. I understand that the average round of golf for 4 players is increased by approximately 45 to 50 minutes due to the severity of the Fescues grown in and entwined with the bluegrasses and ryes..Fairway bunkers that give you no option but to pitch out due to the depth and puffy lips of high grasses.. If their intent was to make it tougher, then they succeeded..Were they thinking of having another major? I have to laugh. The U.S. open in 1981 was like a member guest compared to the super bowl U.S. opens of today. They just don't have the room for all the cities of corporate tents that encompass the U.S. open courses of today. If you want to look at the way a bunker should be designed take a look a little to the west at Applebrook Golf Club. There are some bunkers there that look like God himself made them.. Not a straight edge and a sand pro.. Maybe the greens committee will come to their senses and bring back the natural look instead of the contrived Merion by the sea look!
good luck.

Ross is right. I am guilty of hijacking a simple thread asking about the design characteristics of a GREAT golf course--Merion Golf Club.  (For my critics, please grant me a little latitude here.)

In description, the fact is that Merion, Buddy Marucci bunkers and all is still a GREAT, but forever altered and harmed classic. But for those of you new to Golf Club Atlas, and those of you who have never seen Merion with your own eyes, it is unfortunate that the powers that be so unwisely took away 85+ years of breath-taking evolution by unwisely trying to interpret pictures from 1929. This was the type of restoration that was not only uninformed but ill-advised. The powers that be simply didn’t know how to handle this course with a certain fragility.

Many of you new to this type of talk will no doubt see the new bunkers with clean and crisp lines that look neatly maintained and manufactured. They have a total artificial, constructed look to them and the advent of crushed white marble didn’t do them any favors either. Gone are the intricate slopes, angles, and shapes. In its place are curled-edged “maintained” outlines that depict the bunkers more as modern gimmick that one can see at any CCFAD (Country Club For A Day)

The fact is that the bunkers at Merion may have needed a slight nip and tuck, but nothing so severe as we see today.

The best period to recreate the look of Merion would more then likely be from the 1981 US Open, where it has been described to me that the bunkers fully emphasized the attractive rough-at-the-edges appeal of the course. This look is what DEFINED Merion Golf Club. The Scotch Broom that grew in the bunkers was in full bloom, and the bunkers truly looked ferocious not from depth, but more from that au’natural scrape of  sand and earth exposed from all of the elements of wind, rain, heat and cold battering the rolling terrain. These sand hazards truly were white faces of fear, something to avoid because if you were in one, you were likely being provoked by them to take on “Chance” meaning that recovery was a possibility requiring a deft touch, and they actually invited you to do as such. For the player whose game may not be up to par, this could spell a certain doom. The bunkers also defined the characterization of the site itself--the absolute perfection of the routing of the course. (It happens to be one of my favorite routings in the game) as well as placement of those hazards. While typing this, I can’t help but think of the location of the target of the par 3, 3rd or the slope of the green at #5 which is a study of something many still have trouble understanding--the emphasis of Nature.

I salute the club’s wisdom for wanting to remove encroaching trees and recover fairways, which was tightened for that US Open, but can anyone imagine how great the course would be with that return look of the bunkers and shared fairways? (the maintenance meld that so many of us hope to see recaptured.)

While your original question is mostly pertaining to building Merion-East for one of the computer games, please remember that when doing so that the rugged lines of nature is what Merion was all about--not perfectly clean and crisp computer generated accuracy. It was the informal scraggly lines that were perfect, not the straight ones. I also recommend obtaining a copy of the World Atlas Of Golf, which further depicts the course. I also hope these pictures can help shed some light on what I am talking about.

Good luck.


#1-One of the best opening holes in Golf

#2, with hole #5 at the left. Can anyone see the maintenance meld needed on this hole?

#3 A True White Face]

#4

#7-The apporach in.

#7-This image properly depicts what could have been. These bunkers were properly restored by Gil Hanse and Company along with former Merion Club Professional-Bill Kittleman. Sadly, they were re-restored.

From Hole 7 looking over to green #5. A perfect description of the terrain at Merion

#10

#11-Site of maybe one of the Game’s brightest moments

#12