Did MacDonald/Raynor...

[JNC Lyon]

..build any mediocre golf courses?  It seems like I have heard about very few courses by this duo that were considered upon  opening.  If so, why would this be?  Certainly Ross or Tillinghast built less-than inspiring courses in their day, but they always seem to be ranked ahead of these CBM and SR.

What was the MacDonald version of Shinnecock Hills like?  It couldn't have been too great if they ripped it up and built another course over it.

My guess is that, because all of these courses possessed the same types of holes again and again, and because these holes were always so dependably good, it would have been hard for these guys to construct a truly mediocre course.  It just seems there have to be instances where some holes may have been forced onto the land so that they detracted from the character of the course.  Feel free to include Banks in this discussion, although he didn't have the imagination of MacDonald or the engineering skill of Raynor, so it would have been easier for him to mess up.

[Robert Mercer Deruntz]

Of course they built some not so great courses.  It seems that there is a love is blind love affair with their courses on this site at the moment.  I have played most of their courses.  A few of their mediocre ones were redone in the golden age.  Both North Shore and Sunningdale came to life through Tillinghast.  Both courses have great Raynor holes that were left intact, but needed improvements.

[Mike Sweeney]

What was the MacDonald version of Shinnecock Hills like?  It couldn't have been too great if they ripped it up and built another course over it.

Town of Southampton moved or built the Montauk Highway and built it through the CB Mac course. Thus it was torn up not because of the course.

Not sure how you can really answer this question for reasons like Shinnecock. Southampton GC is probably a Doak 5.5 today but it has been softened and changed a bunch of times so how do you judge what Raynor built.

I normally use Newton Commonwealth in MA as my Donald Ross punching bag, but most of the course has been changed so many times due to housing that it is barely a Ross.

[TEPaul]

First of all, Macdonald's career inventory was a whole lot smaller than Raynor's.

[Jim_Kennedy]

JNC,
I think if you ever get a chance to see the back nine at Essex County CC  you would come away with a better appreciation of Banks' imagination and engineering skill, but that's just my opinion. The most evident critique of CBM and Raynor that offers some way of gauging their level of mediocrity is to peruse the rankings of classic courses and see how many spots they occupy in a list of 100. A 'blind love affair with their courses' might be true if there was no mention of them, but that is not the case.   

I think it was C&W who proposed looking at architects of that era on a tiered scale with a very few (like CBM) occupying the uppermost strata, others (like Raynor) a notch below, and still others (maybe Banks) on the next level. I like to look at it like that, and resist further classification. 

[Jeff_Brauer]

I can't recall a Raynor CBM course I didn't like. I am wondering if I give it my full attention, or if I just let things go because I love the unique style?

[Thomas MacWood]

I don't believe Raynor had anything to do with North Shore. Devereux Emmet designed the original course. 

[TEPaul]

All Devereaux Emmet ever did for North Shore was sell them a pack of hunting dogs. A Brooklyn Tattler newspaper explained that CH Anderson designed North Shore in six hours before taking a slow boat to Venezuela. You should be able to find that article; it's somewhere in the New York vicinity.

[Anthony Fowler]

Ross has his name on quite a few of the "less than inspiring" category.  I think this is primarily due to the fact that he spread his name too thin and slapped his label on courses that he barely (it at all) visited.  We can set aside whether or not this was a respectable thing to do, but if you look at just the courses that Ross devoted his time to, it's a pretty impressive portfolio.

CBM said himself that he only worked (at all) on a very small number of courses: NGLA, Shinnecock, Lido, Chicago, Yale, St. Louis (tell me if I'm missing any).  This is an impressive list as well, but it's a lot easier to get it right when you work on so few courses.  Additionally, 2 of these courses don't exist any more, Chicago has been dramatically changed as I understand it (by Raynor and others?), and at Yale he served in primarily an advisory role.  That leaves only NGLA and SLCC as surviving CBM designs (once again, please correct any mistakes here).

If you held up Ross' courses (only the ones he devoted his time to) to CBM or Raynor, I think DR takes the cake.

[Patrick_Mucci]

I can't recall a Raynor CBM course I didn't like. I am wondering if I give it my full attention, or if I just let things go because I love the unique style?

Jeff,

I can't recall a CBM/SR/CB course I didn't like either.

The presentation, the challenge and the fun derived from playing them made them appealing, to the degree that I looked forward to playing them again ...... and again.

JNC Lyon,

Which holes at what courses did you feel were forced unto the land ?

[Anthony Gray]

I'm sure you are a bit surprised and that's obviously because there's little quesiton you're a useless idiot on an non-stop campaign to convince someone or anyone on here you really aren't a useless idiot. 

  Tom,


  Pebble Beach Rocks!!!!!!

[JNC Lyon]

JNC Lyon,

Which holes at what courses did you feel were forced unto the land ?

I don't have examples, since I've only played a couple Raynor/Banks courses.  I am merely spectulating that there must have been examples where the land didn't dictate the construction of the typical MacDonald holes, but they were built anyway.  I was certainly impressed how Banks laid the Redan 12th at Hackensack across a right-to-left hillside.  However, I am wondering if there are courses where a Redan or other holes were forced into the property.

[wsmorrison]

JNC,

While I don't know how much was changed from original, there is little doubt that the template holes today at Fox Chapel and CC Charleston are not at all in harmony with their surrounds and were forced onto the land.

[Thomas MacWood]

Fox Chapel is not a mediocre golf course, far from it.

[TEPaul]

"However, I am wondering if there are courses where a Redan or other holes were forced into the property."


JNC Lyon:

The redan at Piping Rock is a good example of a hole that it's easy to tell was about 3/4 manufactured and rather massively in a vertical sense off what once originally was natural grade.

I'm not exactly going to say it was "forced onto the land" if that's going to be taken to mean some kind of complete negative but the fact is it was massively manufactured (huge amounts of fill vertically up off original natural grade) and for someone looking for that fact it surely isn't hard to tell.

On the other hand, I think Piping's redan probably plays as well as any other redan I have ever seen with the possible exception of NGLA's.

It's interesting to me since I grew up at Piping Rock and frankly never really considered how completely and massively it was manufactured up vertically, particularly as one goes left. About a year ago I spent about half an hour around it looking at all that fill and it had never even occured to me before where Macdonald/Raynor got that fill but if you study the entire surrounding area that too is easy to tell.

Perhaps the most interesting question would be how many golfers actually consider such a thing. I've come to believe that there may be an increasing number today who are actually beginning to notice naturalism in architecture more and appreciate it but I also think there's another contingent, and perhaps a rather large one, that also notices this fairly obvious manufactured and engineered look and actually admires that too as an example of a certain creativity (perhaps even dominance) of Man OVER Nature (or her occassional limitations for good golf)!


Mr. MacWood:

Who on this thread said Fox Chapel was a mediocre golf course?   

[JNC Lyon]

I have never played Fox Chapel.  One of my good friends is a member there and he loves the course.  However, if the template holes are forced into the land, I feel like this is a feature that would get maligned if designed by other architects, even those of the Golden Age.  

If the architecture goes against the grain of the land at Fox Chapel, then how, Tom MacWood, do you justify that it is 'far from mediocre?'

[JNC Lyon]

"However, I am wondering if there are courses where a Redan or other holes were forced into the property."


JNC Lyon:

The redan at Piping Rock is a good example of a hole that it's easy to tell was about 3/4 manufactured and rather massively in a vertical sense off what once originally was natural grade.

I'm not exactly going to say it was "forced onto the land" if that's going to be taken to mean some kind of complete negative but the fact is it was massively manufactured (huge amounts of fill vertically up off original natural grade) and for someone looking for that fact it surely isn't hard to tell.

On the other hand, I think Piping's redan probably plays as well as any other redan I have ever seen with the possible exception of NGLA's.

It's interesting to me since I grew up at Piping Rock and frankly never really considered how completely and massively it was manufactured up vertically, particularly as one goes left. About a year ago I spent about half an hour around it looking at all that fill and it had never even occured to me before where Macdonald/Raynor got that fill but if you study the entire surrounding area that too is easy to tell.

Perhaps the most interesting question would be how many golfers actually consider such a thing. I've come to believe that there may be an increasing number today who are actually beginning to notice naturalism in architecture more and appreciate it but I also think there's another contingent, and perhaps a rather large one, that also notices this fairly obvious manufactured and engineered look and actually admires that too as an example of a certain creativity (perhaps even dominance) of Man OVER Nature (or her occassional limitations for good golf)!

I think there is a difference between being 'manufactured' and being forced into the land.  Clearly the 11th at CC of Charleston or the 3rd at Yeamans Hall would be examples of holes manufactured out of flat land.  However, they are holes that showcase boldness and originality.  They are not forced into the land because there isn't any land to be forced into. 

The line between creative and forced is a fine one, but I think it is crossed when the architect builds a feature that is unnecessary to the play of the hole, such as a unnatural framing bunker or containment mounding or filler trees.

[TEPaul]

"They are not forced into the land because there isn't any land to be forced into."


JNC Lyon:

Most all golf holes are on land!

"topography" is simply one description of the formation of land but land is land and it is basically the general "medium" of golf course architecture! I think what most are talking about here (in the context of manfactured or engineered looking) is the altering of natural grades in such a way the result looks distinctly unnatural or unlike natural grades.

[Thomas MacWood]

I have never played Fox Chapel.  One of my good friends is a member there and he loves the course.  However, if the template holes are forced into the land, I feel like this is a feature that would get maligned if designed by other architects, even those of the Golden Age.  

If the architecture goes against the grain of the land at Fox Chapel, then how, Tom MacWood, do you justify that it is 'far from mediocre?'

JNC
I would argue Macdonald and Raynor's built up greens have the opposite affect. It allows M & R to maximize the outstanding natural features of the site. You'll often find their greens placed near ravines, brooks, wetlands, ocean and lakes. It also creates a very interesting and often dramatic aesthetic dynamic, the man-made features juxtaposed with marvelous natural features. I believe it was one the secrets of M-R-B's appeal.

Fox Chapel is a combination of a beautiful rolling site featuring a meandering stream and a great collection of outstanding golf holes.

[Mark_Fine]

I always find it fascinating that some can not appreciate (or accept) a variety of architecture styles.  Not every course is "natural" or should I say "found".  Some are "built" for a variety of reasons.  And regarding "forced into the land" - Is Shadow Creek forced into the land?  Is Indian Creek forced into the land?  Is Whistling Straits forced into the land?  It is all a matter of opinion.  Furthermore, we've all played some really bad holes that were not forced into the land.  These kind of holes might have been a whole lot better if the architect had done some forcing 

[Thomas MacWood]

I always find it fascinating that some can not appreciate (or accept) a variety of architecture styles. 

I agree.

[wsmorrison]

Tom MacWood,

I don't agree with your opposite argument at all.  It makes no sense.  However, it seems as if you stumbled upon another concept that everyone else misses, the secret appeal of overtly man-made features juxtaposed to natural features.   What is the use of a secret appeal if nobody but you gets it?  Oh, perhaps you think it is just something that we feel but don't understand.  Hogwash.

Mark Fine,

You are a golf course architect.  Surely you recognize that the architecture of Indian Creek, while completely man-made, has a totally different look and feel than CC Charleston or Fox Chapel.  Likewise there is the example of the Cascades.  Need I remind you, you thought it was laid on the ground in a natural way when in fact it was one of the most engineered courses ever built.

[wsmorrison]

I always find it fascinating that some can not appreciate (or accept) a variety of architecture styles.

One can appreciate and/or accept something and still be critical or have varying degrees of appreciation or acceptance.  It isn't a case of all or nothing.  You guys don't seem to get that. 

[Thomas MacWood]

Tom MacWood,

I don't agree with your opposite argument at all.  It makes no sense.  However, it seems as if you stumbled upon another concept that everyone else misses, the secret appeal of overtly man-made features juxtaposed to natural features.   What is the use of a secret appeal if nobody but you gets it?  Oh, perhaps you think it is just something that we feel but don't understand.  Hogwash.

Are you speaking for everyone now? I'm not the only one who has brought up the interesting aesthetic created by Raynor and Macdonald. Its a well known and accepted phenomenon in the visual arts - juxtaposition and contrast. Good examples in architecture are the interesting contrasts created at FL Wright's Fallingwater and IM Pei's Pyramide at the Louvre.

Although any individual's aesthetic response to a work of visual art will be unique to that individual, many aesthetic principles can be identified and used by the creator of the work to achieve specific aesthetic effects. These include, tonal variation, juxtaposition, repetition, field effects, symmetry/asymmetry, perceived mass, subliminal structure, linear dynamics, tension and repose, pattern, contrast, perspective, 3 dimensionality, movement, rhythm, unity/Gestalt, matrixiality and proportion.

The response to art and aesthetics is unique to the individual, obviously you are not moved. Is it possible you are aesthetically tone deaf?

[wsmorrison]

I do not speak for everyone.  I speak for myself.  What is so secret about the appeal you brought up?  You act privileged to information and understanding.  I don't understand why.

I cannot stand the IM Pei pyramid at the Louvre.  I find it is horrible.  Just so you understand, I speak for myself and not everyone.  As for Falling Water, I love the architecture and the setting.  Wright was able to harmonize the two and utilize integrations of shape, color and other interactions that work for me.  I don't see things as all or none as you do.  I don't see Raynor and Banks golf courses, particularly at the greens, harmonizing with their surrounds in the same way as I see Falling Water and the surrounding woodlands.  Golf courses are organic and the way they were manipulated by Raynor and Banks doesn't work for me.  Again, I speak for myself.  There are no secrets.

Am I aesthetically tone deaf?  I don't think so.  I am clearly not moved by the same aesthetics as you.  Yet although you would criticize me, I don't criticize your tastes.  You are constantly trying to put other people down and build yourself up.  You act insecure and come across as a misanthrope.  Frankly, I don't care what you think of my aesthetic tastes.  I think you are insignificant.