[Ben Sims]

...does an architect have in him?

Tom Doak responds to one of Ran's quotes in the Kyle Phillips interview thread by saying he's designed 30 courses, so it's time to retire.  This is a joke of course, but it bears comtemplation.

How many courses did the designers of great courses, design over their career?  One can always point to Ross or Tilly or Dye with their huge catalog of courses.  But pare the list of those three guys, and the top courses of the country are dominated by architects with relatively few original designs to their names.  On Golfweek's Best Classic and Best Modern lists, the top 10 are populated with names like Crump, MacKenzie, Macdonald, Flynn, Fownes, Coore and Doak (Dye being the exception on the modern list)

Does quality and quantity really have a mutually exclusive relationship in golf architecture?

[Jim_Kennedy]

"Quantity has a quality all its own" - Lenin

Mac/Raynor/Banks always seem to have a dozen or so in the top 100 classic, but there can only be so many top 100 courses. Where does the line for 'great' end, number 101?

The old boys suffered the depression followed by WW2 . By the time all that ended the majority of them were dead.
I'd say that the current batch of architects have an untold number of gems rolling around in their skulls, it just takes a number of people willing to fund those ideas to make them happen.
  

[Mike Nuzzo]

Ben
Do you mean how many does a great architect have in them?

There is a limitation of available projects.
With unlimited opportunities Tom Doak's work could get boring.
He has been working hard at keeping them different - by choosing interesting environments and locations.
Some have said C+C's work has not grown much over the last few projects - may not be so down in Florida.

Have you read the Malcolm Gladwell essay on late bloomers (or an interview on i-tunes too)?
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/10/20/081020fa_fact_gladwell

Because of the sheer time and effort required for a great course - it is possible for an architect to be limited by their own life expectancy not their talent.

[Peter Pallotta]

Ben - your question pre-supposses an objective standard of greatness; or, if it doesn't so presuppose, can only be answered (or likely will only be answered) in percentage rather than absolute terms.  That is, since the work will be judged subjectively and in the context of an entire body of work, it doesn't matter how many truly great courses an architect designs, since the observer will always rank each course in comparison to every other one....which means that some won't be considered great by default/necessity, i.e. you can't have greatness -- subjectively speaking -- if you don't have a certain percentage of courses that aren't great. 

But if you are pre-suppossing an objective standard of greatness, I'd say about 20 is the upper limit in absolute terms.

Peter   

[Phil_the_Author]

Ben,

Another limiting factor is who actually performs the work on the ground that the architect envisioned and put on paper. Great courses are a team effort that way and always have been. Tilly. Ross, Mackenzie and all the others each brought some lousy courses into existence because they simply could not be there to personally oversee the work that had been done. Today's architect has that advantage over the ODG's as their employers demand their presence and pay for it.

Recently I read an article from the Canadian edition of Golf Illustrated in 1925 in which it referred to a course that Tilly was designing up there. This article stated that as of that writing that Tilly CURRENTLY had 51 projects being worked on in the States! 51!

They certainly didn't all turn out to be great ones or we'd know about every one of them today. The only way that is possible is if he WASN'T overseeing the vast majority of the work being done. Today's architects, even when there was a lot of work out there, are more available for personal oversight and quality controls and so they have a better chance to produce better overall creations.

[Duncan Betts]

I think it depends on the definition of great.

There may not be that many great sites left out there where someone is prepared to build a golf course, but some of the great architects might build really interesting courses on less than ideal sites - which might be great work that doesn't result in a 'great' course.

[Mike Nuzzo]

Duncan
I think there are a ton of great sites in Texas, the US and around the globe.

[Philippe Binette]

I don't know the answer but you have to consider that some of the architect best course has to survived trough the years with great maintenance too... so an architect could produce a great course that gets demolished through the years.

take Royal Melbourne, plant trees in straight line along the fairways, flatten some greens, let the bunker become shapeless and it won't be a great course and very few would go out and say: ok we have to restore this course.

producing a great course needs a combinaison of factors to work... that combinaison probably happen 5 times in a lifetime BUT... the key for the architect is to do the best course possible with what he has and always let the opportunity for greatness open.

[Gib_Papazian]

Ben,

It has been asserted that anyone with even a marginal quantity of writing talent has one really good novel in them. It goes along with my theory that the sum total of nearly everyone's experiences contain enough interesting happenings to string together a terrific story.

The same can probably be said about golf architecture. Any well-traveled golfer who takes the time to REALLY LOOK at each golf course they play - beyond just a half-hearted visceral glance -  can certainly piece together at least one really fine golf course on a decent piece of land with some technical assistance.

That is a lot of caveats, but even William Faulkner had an editor.

The difference of course is that most people play golf the way they live their lives, half asleep at the switch - unwilling to expend the mental energy to examine the land forms and strategies in front of them.

I believe that many golf architects lack "greatness" in the same proportion in which they lack observational skills. Prince Puckler was right of course, there are no truly original ideas - only original interpretations of classical arrangements. The more you see, the deeper you Grok the subject and are therefore influenced in the formation of your own conceptualizations.

Doak saw it all twice - and the proof lies in what spewed out of his brain when he was given an opportunity. There is no limit to the number of notable courses he will eventually offer up because his storehouse of visual memories will prove larger than his likely lifespan or number of design opportunities.

Interns chained to a drafting table are limited to flight at low altitudes . . . . .

Speaking of, how goes your training of Iraqi pilots?

      

  

[JMEvensky]

The difference of course is that most people play golf the way they live their lives, half asleep at the switch - unwilling to expend the mental energy to examine the land forms and strategies in front of them.

      

Quoted for greatness.

So,maybe the question should be differently asked.If most golfers don't care to even look for great courses,how many great courses will architects be allowed to build?How many owners/developers will be willing to give an architect the freedom to get to a higher level?

[Gib_Papazian]

In reality - and this is a sad commentary on John Q. Public - it is the critics who determine what is great and what is not. The average shmoe is, well . . . . a shmoe. Maybe it is because they have not had the opportunity or education to appreciate high art, but the fact is that most people are more familiar with Van Helsing than Van Gogh.

Therefore, they depend on the so-called experts to bless artwork or wine or literature or architecture because they simply do not possess the aesthetic sensibilities or a refined enough palette to ascertain the between a pedestrian Merlot and a 1979 Heitz Cellar Cabernet.

We live in a tiny bubble in this corner of Treehouse cyberspace and most of us (starting with me) are completely out of touch with just how ignorant the masses have become in terms of their ability to contemplate and appreciate complex expressions - regardless of the vehicle or art form.

It drove me insane when I would work to polish a magazine or newspaper piece and get no reaction, but receive a slew of compliments when I mailed in simplistic drivel that a chimpanzee could have written in his sleep.

It took a while to realize that most readers do not chew on the texture and cadence of literary prose, but mostly scan a bunch of words looking to harvest a tidbit of information between bites of their doughnut. In the end, I wrote to please myself and the narrow audience actually paying attention.

The appreciation of golf architecture inflicts the same maddening conundrum on the creator. My long held belief of a finite quantity of I.Q. in the world - diminished by the expanding population - suggests it is best to write or design for yourself and your peers. Nobody else cares.

Maybe Ayn Rand had a point . . . .            

[Chip Gaskins]

Gib

My IQ just went up a point or so....just reading your post.  You my friend are a helluva writer!  Please keep posting (on any topic).

Ben

Please define "great".

Also, did we sell the Iraqi Air Force some good ole U.S. fighter planes?  If so, what flavor?

[Jud_T]

Grok has been called.  Perhaps the perfect word to describe truly deep understanding of great GCA.  Gib, you nailed it.  Except for the fact that compared to the '78, the '79 tasted like week-old bong water....

[Duncan Betts]

Duncan
I think there are a ton of great sites in Texas, the US and around the globe.

I acknowledged this in my initial comment, the kicker is if there is anyone out there willing to build (more importantly fund) a golf course on these great sites.

[Sean_A]

The greater the archie both in terms of quality and his quantity, the more people will want to cull his best down to a handful no matter how many great courses he designed.  We see it here on a weekly basis with Ross and I know Colt designed more than a handful of great courses.  People either become contemptuous of the not so well known great courses and/or have a natural tendency to really play up the truly magnificent courses.  I think folks also like to spread the wealth out as it were with these things.  Partly to show off what they know through experience and partly to give a fair shake to archies who (lets face it) were less talented, but may have a few interesting courses on record.  Finally, folks always want to promote archies who were historic figures or built historic courses.  The bottom line is many archies have an unlimited number of great courses in them, its more a matter of who is judging the courses and what their biases are.

Ciao

[Mark_Rowlinson]

Obviously I cannot speak about American designers and courses, but I think it is fair to say that the average standard of the British courses of the golden age of Colt, Fowler, Braid, MacKenzie, Simpson and Abercrombie was pretty fair. I might add Sandy Herd, Vardon and Taylor as well, maybe even Markes. You rarely find an uninteresting course by any of these. Of course, where changes have been forced on a club or a greens committee has sought to ruin a good hole or two for some reason not immediately apparent to us we may be disappointed on a first play, but given the volume of their work and the fact that on few occasions can the architects have supervised construction the average standard is high. How many truly great courses these people did is up to your perception og greatness.

There may only be one great novel in an author, but there are an awful lot of composers out there with a great many masterpieces to their name, Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, unquestionably, and it's then up to your taste whom else. For me, I'll add Schubert (for song, piano and chamber music only), Haydn, Stravinsky, Byrd, Tallis, Purcell, Monteverdi, Verdi, Puccini, Britten, Elgar, Tchaikowsky (in part), Rachmaninoff (again, in part). What, no Mendelssohn, Brahms, Schumann, Wolf, Wagner, Liszt, Schoenberg, Webern, Berg....? Well, if you asked me to write this list tomorrow it would probably be totally different!

[Gib_Papazian]

Jud,

Just out of curiosity, when did you have the opportunity to sample "week-old bong water?" It is a bit like someone saying that Budweiser "tastes like sh*t." The end of the movie Pink Flamingos (John Waters 1972) concludes with Divine eating fresh dog droppings, but aside from him (it?) I've never heard of anyone actually having personal experience to use as a comparison.

The lone exception would be Chris J., the Zonker Harris of USC Fraternity Row in the late '70's. One night a few of us we were partaking in herbal achievement when Chris tipped the bong to his lips and took a large gulp. The gag reflex remembering this display of courageous stupidity continues to this day.

Naturally, we asked him why he was deliberately drinking bong water when he had a cold Heineken in the other hand. Chris (who was a chemistry major) maintained that bong water is actually a primitive tea and that drinking it made certain that you maximized the value of your bag of spliff.

My high schools friends and I manufactured bamboo bongs, complete with scented wax on the mouthpiece and custom made thimbles, specially sized for the stem. We were a fairly industrious group of reprobates who started our fledgling enterprise upon discovery of a 20 square foot bamboo patch on a terraced hillside of a neighborhood yard.

Bamboo grows as thick as sugar cane and nobody noticed our midnight harvests for the first year. It was a different era of course - when the Grateful Dead was the house band in the Bay Area and Winterland was still blasting rock and roll at full volume for $6 a ticket. There was an old black man who ran security on the corner of Post and Steiner. As the crowd shuffled into Winterland, he would repeat "no bottles, no cans and no alcohol allowed."

But a four foot bong didn't even warrant a second look - even from the San Francisco police milling around on the fringes. It was a wonderful era in which to grow up, before American society became a constrictive prison of pointless rules and canned entertainment. Kids were free to try and experiment with anything they chose.

Even drinking bong water.  

[JMEvensky]

Gib,I hope I'm the only one on this site who can attest to the scene in Pink Flamingos.A fraternity brother thought this was the funniest movie ever made and dragged us to see it multiple times.

[Gib_Papazian]

If a poll were taken, I would venture to guess that at least 20 here in the Treeehouse have seen Pink Flamingos. Having met many of the studio audience over the years, I promise you a twisted, macabre underbelly lurks below the surface of our floorboards.

However, I'm certain that I am the only Treehouse occupant who still has my Scratch and Sniff "Odorama" card from the 1981 screening of Polyester.   

[TEPaul]

Gib:

I loved your #10! To add to it, I would say that since you've been a regular on here a whole bunch of what you called Schmoes seem to have found their way into the Treehouse somehow. What I think The Treehouse needs is a really good fumigation! Do you have any recommendation for a really good fumigation service? There are more than enough these days who can't write, can't read, or don't bother to, can't think clearly, can't analyze, but they sure can still pontificate with the best of them!! 

[JMEvensky]

Yes,but how many here have had occasion to use the classic PF line "who would dare send me a turd in the mail"?Maybe not even TEP,I'd bet.

[SL_Solow]

Gib my friend, I hope you recognized me as one who saw the movie.  The era you speak of is fading in the rear view mirror much to our mutual chagrin.  JM;  I use the expression regularly but it is in reference to some of the pleadings sent to me in the course of my professional life.  There are "turds" and then there are "TURDS".

[Gib_Papazian]

Tom,

If there was to be a fumigation of the Treehouse, I am not so sure the Armenian would not be one of the first voted off the island - tossed out the window with Anthony Gray.

Believe it or not, several Treehouse occupants find my obtuse bird-walk vectoring off the 'case at bar' to be annoying.

Particularly our collection of cleverly snarky Brits . . . . .

OT - I just received a phone call via Skype from Ben Sims himself. The connection failed a couple times, but I can report that our resident GCA pilot has not been eaten by the Iraqi natives - which is good news in case he becomes the deciding mail-in ballot on whether to throw me off the website.  

[Gib_Papazian]

And yes Shelly, I count you as one very likely to have a secret collection of John Waters films - right next to Hal Ashby's Harold and Maude, The Last Detail, Being There and an autographed Robert Altman hookah.

I already know the truth about Shivas, so that is not even worth a conversation.

As for being sent turds in the mail, I find it impossible to swallow that bankruptcy motions and pleadings can possibly be more absurd than the family law bullshit that clogs my fax machine.

On second thought, I'm the trustee in a bankruptcy right now, so maybe you have a point.

What this has to do with bong water or how many great courses a designer has in him is beyond me.  

[Ben Sims]

What this has to do with bong water or how many great courses a designer has in him is beyond me.  

I find the connection to be palpable.  How many times in life can one have the clarity of drive and vision that Mackenzie had down in Monterrey or Chris J. had that night in Los Angeles?  Not many I would argue.  

Then again, Chris J. probably inhaled a few more times a week than Mackenzie built golf courses in his life.  There goes my argument.

--By the way Gib, sorry about Skype.  It tends to go in and out based upon how many of us are cruising the SI swimsuit edition at a time--

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