On obscurantist naturalism: MacKenzie's "secret" to making mounds look honest?

[Mark Bourgeois]

It's probably not really a secret, given that MacKenzie actually wrote about it.

MacKenzie wrote how to make mounds appear natural: make them as waves, with "considerable" slope at the bottom but steep – even overhanging – slope near the top.  He also wrote of scooping bunkers out of them and making a certain angle of concavity, although here it's not clear whether he saw the inherently naturalistic aspect of his recommended bunker concavity or just saw the proper angle as necessary to ensure balls rolled to the bunker bottom.

Anyway, I when I read all that I didn't really buy into the notion that angles and concavity could trick the mind into seeing manmade mounding look natural.  I'm sure if you thought about it you would not have seen how mounding can be made to appear natural -- there are so many -- many! -- examples you can call on from your memory that prove the lie.

But recently I saw for once how the concept could be made to work -- it was like a bell tolling: carve out the bunker in a scallop whose apex was pitch-perfect with the apex of the mound! Let sand and mound meet at the peak -- the caldera of the bunker rising to meet the peak in a lovely curve of concavity.

I would add that this little secret represents a very high articulation of the craft of design: getting just the right angle of concavity can’t be all that obvious or easy, nor can scalloping the bunker to the mound’s apex.  These mounds look so effortless and easy, nothing particularly special about them, but when you experience a course that has the work of Mac (including his henchmen) and of "someone else," I guarantee you will notice the difference -- and how labored and ultimately inferior those others are!

So what's the secret that makes this "work"?

Personally, I think it has to do with our own expectations for what is "natural;" ocean waves must somehow shape (sorry!) those expectations or relate to some unstated heuristic our minds apply, subconsciously, in assessing the naturalism of the landscape.  If it looks like a wave, it registers as "natural"…

1. Where have you seen this type of bunkering / mounding?
2. Does it fool anyone else's mind – does it look natural to you, too?
3. Is concavity plus "apex bunkering" the secret to creating natural-looking mounds? Is it a secret law of obscurantist naturalism?
4. If yes, why? Do we expect a "natural" peak to arc into a sharp peak based on what we see in oceans, mountain ranges or something?

BTW, this approach explains why many people note Mac's bunkers appear to disappear when seen from the rear - and maddeningly, seem to want to chalk this up to some sort of "camouflage stunt," as though the Doctor sought only to show off his camo knowledge as some parlor trick, a frivolity.

Examples to follow...

See how perfectly the bunker topline forms the ridge line, and how the ridge line carries on in a wave-like slope:


The photo below illustrates perhaps another secret: don't fill the entire front face of the mound with a bunker.  But this really is just another way of expressing the same principle as above: embed the bunker in a ridge.  If you make the entire mound "face" a bunker, then you haven't created mound-bunker integration, have you?  Good example of scalloping the face, too:


Pay close attention to the shadows in the picture below showing how bunkers relate to ridge lines -- and how that bunker embedded in the back-right mound reduces the apparent scale of what actually is a substantial mound:


Use the bunkers to trace this ridgeline all the way from upper right to lower left in the photo below:


Photo below shows integration of bunkers into very subtle mounds and ridges:


Thanks for any responses,
Mark

[Matthew Mollica]

Mark,

this is an eloquent piece on one of the factors behind the grandeur of the sandbelt courses here in Melbourne. If I'm not mistaken, your photos are from Royal Melbourne (East) holes 12, 16, 17 and 18?

Your most recent visit to Melbourne obviously had an impact!

I wholeheartedly agree on your suggestion that MacKenzie's bunkering styles are distinctly recognized and different to those built on his courses in later years.

I see this often at Victoria, Kingston Heath, Royal Melbourne and some of the old bunkers at Metropolitan.
I'm interested to see where others find such bunkering.

Matthew

[TEPaul]

Mark:

Your first post is so strangely written I have very little idea what you're talking about.

I'd suggest if you really want to see what looks natural with mounding or bunkering simply go out in some natural dunescape or natural landscape or some natural area with running water and just look at what the forces of Nature actually do to the material and medium or sand or earth! 

One doesn't really need to read much more into it or to complicate it much more than that!

But when one begins to copy Nature's influence on other materials or other elements such as water in the form of waves or clouds and such then one is simply getting into some sort of "artistic" interpretation of naturalism with other elements and materials and mediums. If one wants to imitate the real thing then one should observe the material and medium of EARTH or SAND and not necessarily water or clouds or some other "medium".

[Jeff_Brauer]

Mark,

You may be over thinking it.  I have always felt that the more unnatural looking mounds, including some of my own, in the modern era came from being bigger (because they could) and being steeper (as costs rose, the tendency was to go from broad slopes to steeper ones to save dirt).  I think the secret to natural looking mounding is:

1.   Actually make them longer ridges, facing the golfer so he can’t see “the man behind the curtain” (back side)

2.   Broader Slopes (5-10:1 rather than 3-5:1)

3.   Even broader slopes at the mound bottoms (at least 7:1)

4.   Rarely exceed twice the natural slope with built slopes (i.e. if natural slopes are 10:1, max out at 5:1).  (I think I got this one from Tony Ristola)

5.   Rarely double the height of the highest localized ridge – i.e., if there is a 10 foot high ridge somewhere close, 20’ ought to be as high as you build an artificial one.

6.   Make the mound/ridges where the natural high points are and maintain natural valleys.

7.   Build the ridges close to the natural angle that they existed before – NOT to the angle of the green, or to perpendicular to the angle of the green.  You can get some natural looking little areas of steepness this way, and it looks great. When grading from the green back, rather than from the edges in, the tendency is towards similar slopes all around the green.

As to bunkers meeting the apex of the mound, that seems somewhat counterintuitive, but those MacK bunkers do look good.  RTJ built mounds and then fit the bunker in the resulting concave bottoms.  As to what makes an “appropriate” concave slope in a bunker, I think some of the rules above apply as the insides and outsides should all tie together. There are some practical things to consider, like the slope sand will wash out at, etc.

[TEPaul]

"As to what makes an “appropriate” concave slope in a bunker, I think some of the rules above apply as the insides and outsides should all tie together. There are some practical things to consider, like the slope sand will wash out at, etc."

Jeff:

That is precisely why more architects should simply observe the "rules" of Nature. Just study the various angles that Nature creates via the natural forces of wind and water with these materials all by herself and then just imitate them. That's just got to be the most practical and enduring thing to do and also the most "natural". No golf course architect is going to be capable of redefining those realities----not if he wants his architecture to endure for long. We're basically talking about the natural architecture and angles of Nature with the medium of earth or sand----it's in the realm of geophysics or understanding the thresholds of geomorphology, to be exact.

[Mark Bourgeois]

Jeff

I am not sure I am overthinking it.  Here are a few quotes from MacKenzie:

"In constructing natural-looking undulations one should attempt to study the manner in which those among the sand-dunes are formed.  These are fashioned by the wind blowing up the sand in the form of waves, which become gradually turfed over the course of time.  Natural undulations are, therefore, of a similar shape to the waves one sees by the seashore, and are of all kinds of shapes and sizes..."

"Hummocks and hollows should be made of all sorts of different shapes and sizes, and should have a natural appearance, with plenty of slope at the bottom like large waves....the top of a bunker may, as it usually does in nature, be made to overhang a little so as to prevent a topped ball running through it.  Experience gained in the imitation of natural slopes in bunker-making was ultimately responsible for saving tens of thousands of pounds in revetting material in the great war."

If I understand your calculations regarding grade, it sounds like much of what you are doing corresponds to MacKenzie's writings.

MacKenzie's "second career" of military camouflage would have introduced him to concepts and principles for marshalling terrain and natural light to the uses of man.  He would have spent a tremendous amount of time studying how to embed a figure (such as a trench) into an environment.  It's hard to see him forgetting or somehow turning off what he learned there when it came to the work of embedding a hazard, green, bunker, etc. into a terrain.

"In my profession as a constructor of golf courses...any success I have attained I attribute almost entirely to my attempts to make every artificial feature of such a natural appearance that it cannot be distinguished from nature itself.  In attempting to get concealment exactly the same principle applies, the ground should appear as if it had been undisturbed by the hand of man..."

Of course, MacKenzie wrote elsewhere that in constructing golf-course bunkers his aim was not to render the bunker invisible, but by presenting a clear top line such as in the pictures above, his argument was that concealment and visibility were as flip sides of the same coin: that is, the same principles governed them.

Compare this passage on proper trench-making with the one above on proper bunker-making:

"In making a slope of this kind, it is of value to study the kind of slopes which occur in nature and which remain standing for a considerable number of years, for example: if we study closely the slope of a bank of a stream, or a quarry, or the slope of a sand dune, we find that the lower portion slopes considerably whilst the upper portion is vertical, or actually overhangs, as in the diagram; and in constructing the slope of the interior of the trench it is advisable to do it in the same way.  The important thing to remember is that the lower 2 feet or so should slope considerably.  The upper portion can with advantage be made vertical, or even actually overhang..." [All emphases original.]

Clearly he put an enormous amount of thought and effort into understanding principles of nature by which he could hide the hand of man -- really, fool the mind of man.  Knowing how much he dedicated to these thoughts and efforts, when it comes to MacKenzie I don't know if it's possible to "overthink" or "overinterpret" his work. 

Maybe as Mike Young puts it a lot of those early architects' "principles" come to us via seances, but MacKenzie left a clearly and thoroughly articulated set of principles and design techniques.  The more I study what he wrote the more I think it's best to assume the highest order of thought went into a feature or design, then try to reverse engineer what that was.

(Further support for that view is the incredible range of artistic and engineering knowledge he would have been exposed to via his WWI camouflage position.  Even if he disagreed with some of those views, exposure to them would have led him to at the very least refine or better articulate his own views and principles.)

Tom Paul, I think it's great to observe the "rules" of Nature, but you don't think those are necessarily obvious, yes?  I say this because after seeing mounding work done by modern architects on MacKenzie courses, it seemed pretty easy for me -- a rank amateur! -- to distinguish that work from MacKenzie's.

Mark

[David_Elvins]

Mark,

Although not completely related to mounding, I have always loved the way the edge of the bunker below (7th hole Peninsula South course, looking back towards the tee) mimics a natural coastline with its cliffs, bays, etc.  It seems to be an extension of MacKenzie's theories.

[Norbert P]

 David, thanks for that picture. It was one of the most memorable holes there. I believe this bunker is where there was a stand of trees on the inside elbow of a dogleg.  I remember telling "Chainsaw" Mike that the hole looked good both up to the green and looking back. Thanks again - picture filed.  Check for royalties is in the mail.

Below is a picture of a natural blowout bunker and dunes in the Sand Hills. (Dated picture -  may not last long in http)



Notice how the bare sand goes right to the apex of dune. Also notice that dunes are staggered with intermingling base lines, not separated by rhythmic equidistant swales to slopes to swales to slopes, ad nauseum.  They tend, if truely eoleon in design, to randomly intermingle, not line up in orderly fashion. 

  One mounding feature that annoys me is when they are each separately located, not compounded together as they often are naturally.

[Peter Pallotta]

Mark - thanks for the photos; you described what you're seeing there very well, and helped me to see it too.

Nothing much to add except that this thread relates to that very good one you started a while back on MacKenzie's "carnivorous" bunkers, which I remember really capturing something of his ability to camouflage the work when he wanted to

Peter

[Grant Saunders]

I feel that assigning rules and formula to make something look "natural" in some way goes against what you are in fact trying to achieve.

The human mind and eye is very good at picking up on patterns and repeating visuals. If you try to incorporate the same set of criteria to building all landforms and bunkers I think that subconsciously the golfer will sense the hand of man in the creation. They may not be able to in fact articulate what it is that makes the forms appear unnatural but rather feel that something is slightly off kilter.

For me personally, I find the bottom of a slope to be a fair indicator of a whether a landform is constructed or occurs as found. If a form is constructed via fill, the toe of slope is usually fairly straight. It is not to hard to alter the top line and pitch of large amount of fill but it is quite time consuming to move the bottom line as it requires moving a section of the entire mass. This usually stems from the fill being dumped into a marked area (square/rectangle) to the extremities. I would personally love to see trucks operating to a slightly more random shape.

In my opinion, the key to naturalness, is to make shapes that are consistently variable. In other words have some very vague guidelines such as height and width and then operate a with a degree of inconsistency within those stipulations.

However....

Having said all that, the following are some pictures of naturally occuring shapes that I wonder if anyone would in fact emulate on a golf course.

[Mark Bourgeois]

Grant

You are very right regarding irregularity and the need to studiously avoid patterns.  Very interesting regarding the base of slopes.  I think MacKenzie would have agreed with your points; after all, his larger point was the value of and methods for hiding the hand of man.

Regarding irregularity, he actually waged a fight of sorts against military engineers and "regular" military for their desire to make entrenchments neat and ordered:

"Consider what would happen if a civilized man, such as an engineer, is supervising the construction of the same trench.  His whole training has been in orderliness and tidiness, stereotyped patterns, and measuring objects to the thousandth part of a millimeter.  He naturally attempts to make the trench conform to the ideas which have been so successful in civilized walks of life, so he produces his measuring tape and insists that every bay of the trench conform with its neighbour."

Somewhere else he wrote of how farmers and laymen often did a better job because they didn't know how it was "supposed" to be done!

Sound familiar?

Mark

PS The formations in your second and third pictures (well, the first, too, I guess) look like rock rather than soil formations: maybe a batholith (second) and sill (third)? Not sure that counts...

[Carl Rogers]

To the posters on this thread:

Of all the issues, I have read on this site (before ever actually deciding to participate), I have gained more insight on why some courses, despite big bucks, are hopeless duds and why other courses, with modest means, excel from this thread than from almost all the other threads combined.

Thanks

[Peter Wagner]

I feel that assigning rules and formula to make something look "natural" in some way goes against what you are in fact trying to achieve.

Hi Grant,

I can understand why you and many archies might feel this way but math geeks will argue otherwise.  I have degrees in math and computer science and marketing and I vividly remember classes filled with discussion on reducing nature and art to formula.

God (or Mother Nature depending on your point of view) is the only one that can create a natural thing.  Man can emulate and try to create something natural looking and I would call this art.  Related to golf this would make an archie an artist.  Old news to you guys I am sure but I mention it because art is all about math formulas.  Ask Mozart and Michealangelo.

Listen to Mario Livio as he tells us about the relationship of mathematics and art.  8 minutes but worth your time.  Pretend he's talking about golf course design instead of music and I think you'll be surprised by the link. 

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5175371

And of course the Arnie Palmer of his day, Leonardo Da Vinci, was the true master when it came to understanding the art/mathematical link.

http://www.facstaff.bucknell.edu/udaepp/090/w2/Magee.htm
http://library.thinkquest.org/13681/data/links/math.htm  (this one is fun)

Here's some fun stuff regarding my favorite mathematician Blase Pascal (that guy rocked!) with his triangles and also Fibonacci progressions and how they are found in art.
http://milan.milanovic.org/math/english/golden/golden5.html

There are thousands of links like these as this is a popular subject amongst the math-computer geek crowd.

So if we consider someone like McKenzie to be an artist of course design then I will agree that there are formulas to discover in his work.  Ditto all of the great (and not so great) archies of all time.

Best,
Peter

[TEPaul]

"I feel that assigning rules and formula to make something look "natural" in some way goes against what you are in fact trying to achieve."

Grant:

That may be but one can't deny there are various "formulae" that involve the natural forces of wind and water on various earth forms depending on the material involved. If one does not observe those natural "formulae" one certainly does run the risk of having what is man-made fall apart simply because Nature's forces of wind and water are likely to destroy it.

These are the "natural formulae" that architects such as Mackenzie and Behr observed closely and often wrote about. These types of natural formulae are part of what went into Behr's theory on "Permanent Architecture."

[Jon Spaulding]

Mark; interesting topic. I've not seen too much of the wave phenom on his work in the states. So we might wonder if some of the "secret" shouldn't be attributed to Russell and Morcom. The only waves I can recollect would be in Monterey or Michigan, but generally carved out of the natural topography.

[Jeff_Brauer]

Grant,

You said:

"I feel that assigning rules and formula to make something look "natural" in some way goes against what you are in fact trying to achieve."

   and

"I find the bottom of a slope to be a fair indicator of a whether a landform is constructed or occurs as found. If a form is constructed via fill, the toe of slope is usually fairly straight. It is not to hard to alter the top line and pitch of large amount of fill but it is quite time consuming to move the bottom line as it requires moving a section of the entire mass. This usually stems from the fill being dumped into a marked area (square/rectangle) to the extremities. I would personally love to see trucks operating to a slightly more random shape."

    and

In my opinion, the key to naturalness, is to make shapes that are consistently variable. In other words have some very vague guidelines such as height and width and then operate a with a degree of inconsistency within those stipulations. "

I agree with all of those. If you thought my 7 point checklist was "formula" I apologize, and would actually add your points to it.  What we both have in common in our posts is an attempt to explain in simple terms and current English, more precisely what Mac wrote.  After all, what can we learn from a statement of "We must study nature" that we can apply?  When I write about gca, I am on a mission to explain it in simple terms that are useful.  Yes, there are always exceptions and yes we must look at each site a bit differently, etc. but if you don't have a game plan going in, its too late too start when you get on site.

Mac's writings are at least in part flowery marketing statements in what was essentially a marketing book (not educational text) meant to make it sound just hard enough that no one at home would attempt to try golf architecture, at least IMHO!  I gotta study nature? I'll just hire a gca!

And as Peter and TePaul note, I do think there are some math forumlas that do apply in nature in shaping the ground.  Soils have a maximum angle of repose, wind blows at a certain MPH in different areas (yes it varies, but general strength is overall constant) etc., the overall slope of the land determines the steepness of streams and erosive power they have.  The list goes on.  One reason I believe its fair to just move dirt to about twice the natural slope is because it mimics nature for reasons I don't even understand.

Lastly, the hardest part of all of it is the constant variety.  Dozer guys are great, but the machine itself has its own mathmatics and they have the same human tendency of anyone else of going to a comfort zone of what they know and repeating out of habit. 

[TEPaul]

"And as Peter and TePaul note, I do think there are some math forumlas that do apply in nature in shaping the ground.  Soils have a maximum angle of repose,"


JeffB:

When contributors on here such as Mark and Grant start discussing or questioning things like the various natural formulae of earth forms you are very right to bring up the "angle of repose."

Even if MikeY has accused some of us this morning of being excessively dorkish in even attempting to discuss these natural formulae and such, these kinds of mathematical formulae certainly do exist and obviously they do have some applications and relevence to golf course architecture and construction.

Such things about what makes up the "angle of repose" with various materials and particulates and even perhaps Fibonnacci numbers, the "Golden Angle", the "Golden Ratio" and things like "coefficient of friction". 

There is perhaps another point of discussion here Jeff, because much of the foregoing essentially pertains to what it takes to make things in relation to those formulae so that it may endure and be more permanent in golf course architecture. But what if a golf course architect intentionally decided to make some things so that they would exceed those formulae and consequently evolve and devolve through the natural forces of wind and water and some of the recognized physics of Nature? Now we are into the actual mechanics of Nature herself. It doesn't get much more natural than that.

In some ways it seems the ongoing maintenance considerations of Sand Hills GC is into the latter to some degree. Coore told me they hadn't decided to try to permanently stabalize things or just watch for a while as Nature's forces evolved and devolved them.

[Jeff_Brauer]

TePaul,

Thanks for those comments, at least I think!

To start with, don't ask HOW I know, but I know that if I build cut slopes like bunker faces, steeper than the angle of repose, they do not last.

I believe it has happened a lot that gca's exceed natures rules. Sometimes its okay.  For example, courses in flood plains tend to be fairly flat, and the silty soils certainly have an angle of repose greater than the surrounding ground.  Thus, if we choose, we can add artificial mounds. (and, we have chose on numerous occaisions, deeming the "public's right to something more interesting" more important than natures guidelines)

As far as planning for evolvement, you would have to be pretty smart to do that!  In terms of sand blowouts, they occur at natural, but hidden (my understanding is its soil composition, direction the slope is facing, etc) and generally random occurrences.  Like TOC, a bunny could choose to nest in a particular spot, weaking the vegetative cover, which eventually leads to the blowout.

And of course, in housing developments, blowouts are not always considered a good thing!  The tendency is to "tame the landscape" in all urban areas for practical reasons.  Sand Hills is a special case where that would work.

[TEPaul]

"To start with, don't ask HOW I know, but I know that if I build cut slopes like bunker faces, steeper than the angle of repose, they do not last."


JeffB:

Don't worry I wouldn't ask because I already know how you know. It's called "empirical knowledge"---ie experience!   

I mean have you ever seen one of your shapers jump out of his dozer and check "Fibonnacci Numbers", "Golden Angle or Ratio" or "coefficient of friction"? Have you ever done that? Do you even know what they are? Have you even bothered to go to Home Depot and get one of those $39.95 plastic gizmos that can tell you what they are?   

But architects make those kinds of mistakes of exceeding those things all the time, always did and probably always will. Look at Crump on the original sand bunker faces fronting #2, #10 and #18 at Pine Valley. They looked cool, I guess, but it didn't take long for them to collapse taking a part of their greens with them.

There was even this architect at Doak's Archipalooza at the opening of Pacific Dunes who put up a slide show on a course he did of this green hanging out over the ocean in Japan. The slide show chronicled the approximately five times Mother Nature destroyed the thing as they continued to rebuild it in the same place and in the same way in about as many years. He even seemed to brag about how much the thing had cost to date----something like $5 million.

We all looked at each other wondering what the hell this was about and where he was going with it. I think he even said they were just about to rebuild it again.

I mean, come on, what was going on there? Were they trying to see how much money they could spend constantly F...ing with Mother Nature year after year? Were they trying to find out just how stupid one can be? Maybe one of these years they'll figure out maybe they ought to put that green somewhere else. On the other hand, maybe they won't.

[Peter Wagner]

Hi Jeff,

Yep, I agree with Tom that through experience 'you just know'.  Certainly there are many artists that have no knowledge of the underlying math and many of them have done great things.  I'm not saying that you have to be a math whiz to design a good track.  I will say that if one were to take the time to understand the underlying mathematics of truly great course design AND that person had talent then that person would have a large advantage in this field.

Here's an example:  the Rule of Thirds.

In photography and art classes one of the first things taught is the Rule of Thirds. 
http://digital-photography-school.com/blog/rule-of-thirds/

Many here know and employ this in their amateur photography.  I would think an interesting experiment would be to stand on a tee of a highly regarded hole and hold up a cardboard cutout of the grid shown in the above link.  Do the dramatic visual elements coincide with the Rule of Thirds?  I don't know but I'd love to survey a couple of hundred great holes this way and record the result.  I'd survey from the tee and also from the likely approach shot position.

Sure this whole topic may seem dorkish but if the above experiment showed a distinct correlation then wouldn't this be an excellent tool for archies in an effort to add visual stimulation.

Just some idle thought.

Best,
Peter

[Jeff_Brauer]

Peter,

Yes, some of the great archies, with no real training understood artistic composition quite well.  Just as some people understand quantum physics almost intuitively. 

But obviously, as someone started studying such things, and wanted to communicate to others, they had to have some sort of rules, writings, etc. just to organize and clarify the "mysterious" art of composition. 

In the middle ages, medical procedures and astronomy were just as mysterious!  In all endeavors, it seems like science slowly increases in signifigance and mystery slowly declines, no?

[TEPaul]

"In the middle ages, medical procedures and astronomy were just as mysterious!  In all endeavors, it seems like science slowly increases in signifigance and mystery slowly declines, no?"

JeffB, you have a good point there. You know what, about seven years ago this great aunt of mine was canonized as the fourth American saint and because of that I felt the need to do some research on this MIRACLE crap that someone has to pass muster on a couple of times to become a saint.

In the process of checking out her two Miracles (out of about 1500 reported Miracles) that passed muster I discovered that a pretty good number of saints are getting dropped and one reason for that is modern science now quite easily can explain why some of their past Miracles weren't Miracles at all.

But you know me---I'm not into either religion or science or medicine. Back in the dark ages if someone had a severe headache the procedure was to smash a hole in their skull to let the ache out of their head. That sounds pretty reasonable to me.

So who really knows about the credibility of some of these "formulae" about Nature and physics? It wouldn't surprise me if next year some scientist proves this Fibonnacci guy wasn't even smart enough to cook spagehetti.

[Grant Saunders]

Jeff

I was not in any way implying that your checklist was in fact a formula for building landforms. In fact, I feel that your list simply sets out the guidelines to operate within when creating the form. This is very much in line with the comments I made regarding the need to keep things variable.
I have not had the pleasure of reading MacKenzie's writings on the subject but hopefully one day will get the chance. I am also unsure as to exactly what the "angle of repose" is but it sounds very cool. Maybe this is one of those things that is simply understood by some without even knowing what it is or its function.

TEPaul

You said   "one can't deny there are various "formulae" that involve the natural forces of wind and water on various earth forms depending on the material involved."

Again, I am not disputing what is being said here. I just think this is another example of man trying to rationalise and control our environment. For me, a good example is the seasons. We have assigned 3 month intervals of the calender year to each season. Here, in the southern hemisphere spring occurs from September to November. Over the past few years, it seems that we have winter weather and temperatures further into September. This has the effect of people saying that spring is happening later. To me this shows that nature is unpredictable and we should not be trying to rationalise it by placing criteria for it to adhere to IE our calendar year.

I think that nature causes/creates things that can be explained by numbers but it does not adhere to these said fomula.  Its like predicting the weather(not very exact) versus explaining what weather we have just had and why (much more accurate).

I hope that makes sense as I found it quite hard to articulate quite what I am getting at. The pictures I posted were to try and demonstrate that even natural can look unnatural/unusual.

For me, the best lesson I have learned so far, is that when building landforms to look at the big picture.
In other words, look at the surrounding area for inspiration.





 

[TEPaul]

“I am also unsure as to exactly what the "angle of repose" is but it sounds very cool. Maybe this is one of those things that is simply understood by some without even knowing what it is or its function.

Grant:

Here is a basic definition of the “angle of repose” as it generally applies to such golf architectural things as the angle or slope of sand faces on bunkers.


“The angle of repose is the maximum angle of a stable slope determined by friction, cohesion and the shapes of the particles.”

Obviously to exceed a particular applicable "angle of repose" with various types of material the material will lose its cohesion and begin to slide or collapse.

[TEPaul]

"Again, I am not disputing what is being said here. I just think this is another example of man trying to rationalise and control our environment."

Grant:

I don't think so. Undertanding some of these physics formulae such as what goes into establishing an "angle of repose" and applying them to man-made things in golf architecure is more like man trying to stay in tune with the forces and inherent mechanics of Nature itself and less like man trying to rationalize and control our natural enviroment.