[Ryan Farrow]

Were the bunkers created form scratch?

If 100 years ago they did it for aesthetics then it is a fair enough decision to make in this day and therefore we should not describe them as fake.  But if modern equipment has been used to create an older look then it is a fake look.

If they were created with antique technology then that might negate the fake tag is it would be an interesting experiment to try and create bunkers without modern construction tools.  You cant complain if that is all that is possible with the technology.

Are there any before pictures of the sites where the bunkers are so we can see if they have indeed been constructed like a bunker 100 years ago or made to like they have been.  If they have just been made from scratch then how can they be described as anything other than “faux antique”?

Yea Ross, I can see it now. Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner out on site for the next 3 years with a horse and plow creating each bunker by hand using construction methods from the early 1900's to create a "Real Antique" look. Because YOU would have noticed the difference!

Your comment, and Melvyn's, and Mark's are so outrageous and laughable.

Their well informed design decision was made in part, to make the golf course look as though it had been there for 100's of years. It is something almost all GCA's strive to achieve.  And in my opinion it has been one of the most successful attempts I have ever seen. Your attempts to stand out from the crowd have made all of you look a bit silly. And have detracted from the conversation of the actual golf course.

[Chris DeNigris]

This may have already been mentioned but "fake" is a highly inflamatory and derisive way to characterize someone's work. Ditto for faux.

Fake would be if they used Trex for sleepers.  

Fake also somewhat connotes intent to deceive or misrepresent.

An overt design technique that seeks to emulate and even pay tribute to something that's admired and even revered from past works should probably not be lumped into the same type of context as a forged painting.

As previously mentioned, those seemingly intent on focusing on this narrow aspect of the course also, not coincidentally, have voiced issues critical of non-architectural aspects of CS. That, coupled with the fact that they've never set foot on the property, creates the perception of dishonest criticism. The perception.

That being said, if that's the most that the toughest potential critics can come up with, to coin a TH phrase- ding, ding, ding, we have a winner.

[Ross Tuddenham]

Ryan Farrow

I am not saying that they should have done that I was just trying get some ideas down to see what it was that made people call the bunker look fake.  At no point did I say i thought it looked fake.  I was just interested to see what they could have done to avoid the fake tag people have given it.

If we could establish

I think the cart path is the only thing that I know for sure would not be to my taste if I saw it for real.  The dynamite comment was tongue in cheek so I retract that if I have offended you.

I was only trying to establish a set of conditions we could look at to see if there was an element of any "fake" to the look.  But as has now been pointed out the term fake is inflammatory and so potentially we need to find a term to better describe the elements of the look.

[Tom_Doak]

Once again, a thread about architecture devolves into a thread about bunker styling.  Imagine!

I did not have a chance to get up to Castle Stuart this past week, and I'm sorry I didn't.  From reading through this thread, the argument seems to me to be not just about the "style" of the bunkering, but about the quantity of it.  There are so many pictures of these "neat-o" little features that one gets the impression that they dominate each and every hole. 

For those who have played the course, is that really the case, or do you not notice them so much except when you are in them?  I think the answer would make a difference in how I viewed them.

[Paul_Turner]

I think it all looks a refreshing change for Scottish links.  Especially as the R&A and links trust have steadily stripped the character and individuality out of our famous links.

[Tom_Doak]

Amen to that.

[Niall C]

Niall -

I think Castle Stuart will prove to be a wonderful combination of great golf AND great aesthetics. The only way you will know for sure is to play it some time.

DT

David

I certainly aim to play it, and suspect I will enjoy the round. Whether or not I will apreciate the aesthetics when I see them in the flesh remains to be seen. Of more interest will be how the bunkering comes into play, how the course plays, does it play like a links etc.

Niall

[David_Tepper]

Tom Doak -

I think, if you review the posts of the people who have actually played and/or seen the course in person, the consensus is the experience of the course as a whole overwhelms the bits and pieces of it.

DT

[Niall C]

Niall,

What is a "fake style" of bunkers?  Could you provide us with examples of what a "non-fake style" of bunkers would look like.   

It sounds a bit like you are not familiar with this style, and it makes you uncomfortable, so you call it "fake style."   Was it "fake style" in 1897?   Or is the problem that these bunkers are in the style of those in 1897?   Would it be real style if they were in the style of 1997?   1987?  2007? What is real about those styles?

David

Perhaps I should have said fake antiquity instead. There is a real mish mash of styles going on. Perhaps when the course matures it will all blend in more.

In terms of being familiar with the style, I can't say I've played a course with this style but the look of Castle Stuart does look more like some of the US courses highlighted on this site than it does to your typical links over here. Does that in itself make it a bad course ? Probably not, but it does make me feel a bit uneasy seeing it passed off as a traditional links when the styling and possibly the layout are more akin to a US course IMHO.

Niall

[Niall C]

Yea Ross, I can see it now. Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner out on site for the next 3 years with a horse and plow creating each bunker by hand using construction methods from the early 1900's to create a "Real Antique" look. Because YOU would have noticed the difference!

Your comment, and Melvyn's, and Mark's are so outrageous and laughable.

Their well informed design decision was made in part, to make the golf course look as though it had been there for 100's of years. It is something almost all GCA's strive to achieve.  And in my opinion it has been one of the most successful attempts I have ever seen. Your attempts to stand out from the crowd have made all of you look a bit silly. And have detracted from the conversation of the actual golf course.
[/quote]

Ryan

If the course had been there for hundreds of years you wouldn't have the bunkering the way it is. Those bunkers with the ragged edges etc would probably have been revetted well before you would have got into the 20th century. Thats what happens with old links, they evolve. As for the revetting between the different levels of grass, what greenkeeper/super put there would tolerate that for a minute if given the chance to turf over it. In fact what am I saying, what greenkeeper in his right mind would have built it in the first place.

If this course is a throwback to over a hundred years ago, wheres the flat square greens ? Ryan, you have accused myself and others who have made critical comments on the styling as looking a bit silly. I note that the others like me play there golf over here and I would suggest have more knowledge and better feel for the tradition of the links, how they evolved etc than perhaps you do. And I mean that with all due respect.

Niall

[Niall C]

I think it all looks a refreshing change for Scottish links.  Especially as the R&A and links trust have steadily stripped the character and individuality out of our famous links.

Paul/Tom D,

Not sure I'm with you on this. Care to elaborate ?

Niall

[Brian Phillips]

Once again, a thread about architecture devolves into a thread about bunker styling.  Imagine!

I did not have a chance to get up to Castle Stuart this past week, and I'm sorry I didn't.  From reading through this thread, the argument seems to me to be not just about the "style" of the bunkering, but about the quantity of it.  There are so many pictures of these "neat-o" little features that one gets the impression that they dominate each and every hole. 

For those who have played the course, is that really the case, or do you not notice them so much except when you are in them?  I think the answer would make a difference in how I viewed them.

Tom,

At no point did I feel "over bunkered" on the course.  I just always take a lot of photos close up of bunkers as I like to have detail of different types of bunkering to load into the memory banks.

There is so much width on the course that the bunkers are blended into the lanscape fine.

Brian

[Niall C]

Brian

How does it play, does it play like a links ?

Bunkering - do they dictate strategy or do other factors come into play ?

Also, do the bunkers gather the ball or are they perhaps a bit more benign ? One of things Mark Parsinen tried to do at Kingsbarns was make it look hard but play easy, which I think was what he was trying to do here, did he succeed ?

Niall

[Brian Phillips]

Niall,

It plays like a links as the course is built on pure sand.  Greens are bent/fescue and have a typical links feel.  The greens are designed very much like old links courses in that there is not that movement within the greens but lots of movement outside the greens.

The bunkers are very much in play.  I did not notice that the bunkers gathered like Muirfield or Renaissance.  Yes, I would agree that the course looks a little more difficult than it actually is.  We played it in a 2 club wind most of the day with a 4 club wind on the holes on the top such as 13, 14, 15, 16 and 17.

It is not easy but it makes you think.  On 17 we played from the whites and that was 210 yards with a 4 club wind.  I had to hit driver to get pin high.  I am not a short hitter (I think Tom can confirm this as I played with him this week) so it is not easy off the whites.  What we did was play the whites with the wind (apart from 17) and off the green tees into the wind and that made the course fun!

Brian

[Niall C]

Brian

Many thanks for that. I very much like your description of the movement being off the greens rather than on them. Hopefully I'll get a chance to play up there in the next few months.

Niall

[Tom_Doak]

Niall:

I took Paul T's comment about "the R & A and links trust have steadily stripped the character out of our famous links," as it refers to bunkering, meant that the art of building more natural-looking revetments in bunkers has given way to making the bunkers deeper and more penal on championship courses.  And the R & A has not been shy about doing so ... they seem to stiffen the bunkers for championships as reflexively as the USGA adds tees.

The bunkers at Muirfield and St. Andrews have gotten steadily steeper-faced and less natural-looking over the years I've seen them, and they were the best of the bunch.

[Paul_Turner]

Niall

Yes as Tom states that's basically what I meant.  Turnberry, Lytham, Hoylake, Sandwich etc all had different trap styles but now they're much more homogenized and uniform.  Basically you get a circular, oval or figure 8 outline with a vertical sod/brick face and dead flat sand bottoms.

We don't have this kind of variety anymore, 18th at Lytham from about 50 years ago:

[Grant Saunders]

For those who have played the course, is that really the case, or do you not notice them so much except when you are in them?  I think the answer would make a difference in how I viewed them.

Tom and others

From memory, and a quick look through my photos, I think the course has around 50 bunkers not including the 'blow out areas" outside the holes. At the time I was last there, I believe that sleepers had been utilised in maybe 6 or so of the bunkers. These may have been added to since but I wouldnt imagine it would be a very dramatic increase. These numbers are to the best of my recollection. There most definitely is not the feeling of this being the dominant style at all and it certainly has not been overused.

As for the revetting between the different levels of grass, what greenkeeper/super put there would tolerate that for a minute if given the chance to turf over it. In fact what am I saying, what greenkeeper in his right mind would have built it in the first place.

Niall

Niall

You may find interesting that in the construction team of approx 12 or so, 10 of the people are in fact greenkeepers or former greenkeepers. This includes the project manager who is now general manager and the superintendent who was also a shaper on the project. Jim Wagner is also a former assistant superintendent.

[Mark Pearce]

Yea Ross, I can see it now. Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner out on site for the next 3 years with a horse and plow creating each bunker by hand using construction methods from the early 1900's to create a "Real Antique" look. Because YOU would have noticed the difference!

Your comment, and Melvyn's, and Mark's are so outrageous and laughable.

Their well informed design decision was made in part, to make the golf course look as though it had been there for 100's of years. It is something almost all GCA's strive to achieve.  And in my opinion it has been one of the most successful attempts I have ever seen. Your attempts to stand out from the crowd have made all of you look a bit silly. And have detracted from the conversation of the actual golf course.

Ryan,

A number of people have attempted to engage in a serious discussion of golf course architecture here.  Most have read my posts and those of Marty, Niall and Russ.  Some have even managed to understand our point.  No-one has seen the need to resort to name calling or insults.

Your post shows that:

1) you haven’t read our posts; or

2) you haven’t managed to understand them.

I’m feeling generous, so I’ll go for option 1.  However, I’d love for you to give me (since it’s "something almost all GCA’s (sic) try to achieve") a list of 10 courses built in the last 10 years where the architects have attempted to make the course look as if it has not been maintained for 100 years.

And yes, someone has made themselves look silly on this thread but don’t worry, we’ll forget in time.

[Mark Pearce]

For those who are not stoked on the bunker style implemented at CS - umm - okay.

But what would you rather have?

1960s saucer bunkers?
Shaggy/natural bunkers?
Only riveted?
No sleeper use in bunkers?
What is a modern bunker?
What type of bunkering would be better suited to the land? (Honestly, I am curious)

Clearly, Parsinen and Hanse created this course melding several genres of design from periods in GCA history in an effort to created an immediate modern classic. The team at OM are doing the same thing, sort of, by channeling the spirit of CBM as you can see in the HB photos on the Long hole there.

I think the efforts of these architects should be celebrated. We have lived through years and years of highly paid GCAs mailing in projects based on topo maps with no thought to finishing detail or using the natural landscape.

What the team at CS have done is commit fully to the project and sweat every element of the design. Maybe the sleepered "pop" machine was going a bit too far, and some of their efforts may be a little to deep into the minutiae but based on the photos, videos, etc. of this course, I think it should be toasted as nothing short of fantastic.

I know it is easier for us on this side of the pond to support "modern classics" because we have very few "classic classics", but it is beyond me how passionate fans of GCA would not be as excited about CS as they should be about Old Macdonald - these are not dime a dozen projects, no matter what country you live in.

A great links course is like a wonderful single malt - it gets much better with time - unfortunately creditors are not interested in waiting that long so investors need to speed up the process these days to pay the vig

Rob,

It’s not the style of the bunkering that bugs me.  Nor (for those fixated on the mere use of sleepers) is it the use of sleepers.  It’s the way the bunkers (and the sleepers) have deliberately been constructed to suggest that they have been decaying, without maintenance, for years.  If the intention is to mimic an old style, why not build bunkers (using sleepers if you want) that look like bunkers built 100 years ago looked when they were built, 100 years ago.

As to the classic classics, none of them look (in the detail) like CS.  All are neater and better maintained.  No-one has yet produced evidence that these classic courses looked as ragged as CS when they were new.

[Mark Pearce]

Mark

Of course I think the detail matters. I just feel that some people are getting hung up on what is only a small element of this golf course.

"Create a palpably visual and distinctive personality for the course, through its contours, bunkers, landscape mosaic, and optical compositions."

The above quote is lifted form the course goals page on the Castle Stuart website. I feel that this perfectly describes what they have tried, and in my opinion, achieved with this project. I dont believe that its trying to copy anything else but simply incorporate ideas and features that the designers respect. They have then combined them in a way to produce something that has its own distinct personality.

As for question regarding cathedrals: of course I would look at the gargoyles but I wouldnt pass judgement on the whole building if perhaps they were facing up instead of down.

Grant

Grant,

I'm not passing judgment on the whole building though, am I?  I'm questioning a feature of it.  Which doesn't seem to be allowed./  I can't (as has been pointed out) pass judgment on how the course plays until I have been there.  I can only comment on what I see, and that is the detail.  I'd have thought that this was core GCA discussion but apparently not.

[Mark Pearce]

David,

I hope you don’t mind me using your (thoughtful) post to clarify my personal position.

Melvyn,   

I have watched the video, a few times.   Is it possible that you are misunderstanding Gil's intention?   He did say that he felt the bunkers were unlike any other in the world, but he also said that the bunkers were modeled after photos of bunkers from Hutchinson's 1897 book.  I am not sure how you go from this to "he has produced a totally fake bunker arrangement for the course."   

I must be misunderstanding.  How does modeling bunkers after those from pre-1900 links courses make them fake?     

I don’t have an issue with modelling bunkers from the pre-1900 era. I really hope that’s clear by now.

As for the riveting, could you explain what makes it "fake riveting?"  I don't think it is a facade-- now that would be fake.  I think it is real riveting, and as I understand it they used it for stylistic reasons but also in places where they foresaw cave-ins and erosion.  In your mind should they have waited until the bunkers collapsed to include it in the design?   (My understanding is that Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner often stack sod on the upper portions of their steep bunkers to help with future potential erosion problems.)

As for the RR ties, have you ever worked with them?  They are generally purchased used, from torn up old track, and are pretty rustic.  Maybe they once were, but after decades in the conditions they are by no means uniform.  People that use them had better be comfortable with a rough, old look because the that is how the RR ties are.    So I find it a bit odd that you would require anyone to stack them exactly and evenly. 

But look at some of the well known use of sleepers (or railroad ties) on the famous links.  They are just that, stacked exactly and evenly.  Early architects (and those who constructed their courses) took as much care in the detail of those courses as modern architects and shapers, didn’t they?

That being said, I think that perhaps two of the photos showing the same bunker best represent what you are saying:   





I really don't mind the look of the RR ties on the right.  They seem to be serving a purpose.     I am not so sure about the ties on the left, as they just sort of seem to be sitting there.  Do they serve a purpose other than aesthetic?   I don't know.

  Yes, you do know.  The purpose they serve is to make it look as if, in an earlier era, that bunker had a different shape and has worn and deteriorated, without repair, over many years.  That’s not true but it’s the message those sleepers are there to give.

As for these next two photos, I have no problem with how the ties are used in either.   They certainly serve a purpose-- supporting the embankment in the first and keeping carts on the paths and out of the native.   (We might agree that a better solution would be to keep the carts off the course all together.)  And having worked a bit with RR ties, I think it would have been a mistake to try and square the RR ties.  As I said, they don't match well anyway and forcing formality where it doesn't flow naturally from the conditions is not my idea of good design. 

But why the uneven top line?  There are sleepers here without function, just form.  Point me to examples of that from yesteryear.

Is it a Scottish thing, I don’t know about you but I’m not keen nor like the idea of the wool being pulled over my eyes. You guys may have to accept it in the States but its piss poor show to do it in Scotland. Its fake, counterfeit, I feel a party to a sting, it just does not seem right, however the course may well be most enjoyable, but that does not stop it being wrong. That’s my opinion, not Niall or Mark or Marty. 

Melvyn

Please don't take this the wrong way, but is it possible that you are maybe taking this a bit far?  I agree with your general sentiment, but not sure the photographic evidence justifies the position in this case. 

Maybe it is just that I am willing to give these particular designers (at least one half of the team) the benefit of the doubt, at least until I see the course.  Hanse and Wagner (and Shackelford) designed and built my home course.  I've been told they moved less than 17,000 cubic yards of dirt in building it.  In other words, they essentially took what the land gave them and there is very little that is artificial or forced.   So maybe I am biased going into looking at these photos, and more likely to try and understand what they are trying to do.

But isn't it possible that you to are coming at this with a certain point of view that might negatively influence your view of designs that come to close to emulating the old courses you so love?

I guess this is my bottom line question for me.   If the pre-1900 links courses were so great, then what is wrong with trying to emulate them, right down to the look of the bunkers?   

Nothing wrong with trying to emulate that look. But that’s not what this is about.  If they had built a course in the style of a pre-1900 course, AS IT WOULD HAVE APPEARED AT THE TIME, I wouldn’t have had an issue.  That would have been brave and exciting.  It’s trying to make it look like it had been there for 100 years that I don’t get, not least since none of the courses that have really been there for 100o years have the same look of decay that this detail is intended to suggest.

[Marty Bonnar]

Questions regarding bunker detailing are so far away from the intent of my original criticism that I feel the need to re-state my position and hopefully better explain where I'm coming from.

Hopefully, one thing we might all agree on here at sunny GolfClubAtlas is that Golf Course Architecture, like its prettier sister, Landscape Architecture and like its more muscular big brother, built Architecture, is an ART FORM. NOT a Science and NOT Engineering. Sure, elements of those fields are involved, but PRIMARILY, golf course architecture is ART.

Do we agree on that?

For that is my initial position on all golf course architectural discourse. If we don't agree on that, we can agree on nothing else.

Now then, if gca is Art, then we can only logically examine and criticise it so. Thus, my contention is that truly great Art can only be ORIGINAL. Truly great Art can only be a product of great creativity. Truly great Art transcends its environment, its time and its place.

Truly great Art might reflect and REFERENCE truly great Art of the Past, but it always does so in the company of new, ORIGINAL thought and with an execution which brings something NEW to the scene.

Lucky me, I had an education which covered Art, Architecture, Landscape Architecture and Golf Course Architecture and I've had a wealth of experience in Occupations which have further strengthened that knowledge with practical experience. I've read the books and attended the seminars. A good few folk around here would do well by themselves in reading some of the tomes regarding 'Truth in Architecture'. There's plenty of them out there from Palladio, through Ruskins Seven Lamps to 'The Fountainhead' and the seminal Charles Bronson's 'Death Wish' Series. SEE, I couldn't be THAT serious for THAT long, now could I...

cheers,
FBD.

[Sean_A]

I think the course looks very interesting and easily one of the five or so courses built in the past 20 years that I would to see most.  There are a few areas of what looks to be waste sand which I don't like and there will definitely be problems keeping the sand in some of the bunkers.  That said, it seems to me that low lip bunkers tend be on sides where some sand can spill without too much of a problem.  Like Paul, I like the variety of styles, but more importantly how they flow into the surrounds and lead to odd runoffs.

Does the sea really come into play anywhere? How bout a burn?

Brian - thanks for posting!

Ciao  

[Paul_Turner]

Pre 1900 links were rugged by default.  

It didn't matter if the course was newly "laid out" or had been there for 100+ years,  all of them used hazards that were naturally formed.

I believe Gil Hanse used Hutchinson's "British Golf Links" 1897 which has photos of "old" (St Andrews etc) and "new" (Porthcawl, Dublin ,Rye etc) courses at that time.

They are indistinguishable because they are, in the main, naturally formed:









Comparing these old pics with those Brian posted and I think it's obvious that Gil has done a cracking job that's in the true spirit of the original links golf.  He didn't have naturally formed bunkers but has done a fine job recreating them and apart from Royal County Down try and find another GB&I links that has hazards with as much rugged appeal.  

OK some might think the sleepers are a bit affected but I like 'em, they show a bit of flare and remind me of Pete Dye at Casa.

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