[David_Tepper]

"Be an intriguing exercise to have a totally flat piece of featureless, obstruction-less, entirely short grass land with a huge high wall around it to blank out any views and layout 18 holes.
Only have 18 x tee markers and 18 x 4.24” holes in the ground with short flagsticks denoting the positions.
And then just play golf on it.
Varied outcomes and popularity likely.
Each to their own though."

My thought is that would be a good way to kill the game once and for all.

[Ben Hollerbach]

Be an intriguing exercise to have a totally flat piece of featureless, obstruction-less, entirely short grass land with a huge high wall around it to blank out any views and layout 18 holes.
Only have 18 x tee markers and 18 x 4.24” holes in the ground with short flagsticks denoting the positions.
And then just play golf on it.
Varied outcomes and popularity likely.
Each to their own though.

Atb

A golf course of that design would still be too difficult for the average player to shoot a score of par.


But because the challenge for the player on this course would be their own physical limitations at striking and controlling the golf ball, the player would most likely find the round as compelling as an afternoon at the driving range.


Which is the fundamental difficulty in designing a course for a wide range of skill sets. How to make a course compelling and engaging for the better player while not making it overly difficult for those players who inherently need minimal difficulty?


In this context "too many notes" could be a cluttering effect of the players visuals, or an over penalization of a hole that does not demand it. The counting of which notes are important and which ones are extra could be very different from one player to another, based on how they interact with them.


Which then suggest that editing should not be removing obstacles  until there are one to few, it should be adding obstacles until there are one to many.

[Tom_Doak]

I just played Walter Travis’ Hollywood GC. They had one hole called the Heinz 57 hole because it originally had 57 bunkers. When Tom Doak restored it I think he only put in 37 on that hole.  The course overall must have over 200 bunkers and frankly it looks amazing (glad I am not the super because they all need hand raking).  Does the course have too many notes?  Travis didn’t think so or he wouldn’t have designed it that way.
 

Mark:


As I've mentioned several times before here, the work at Hollywood is nearly all Brian Schneider's . . . I did make one brief visit during construction to have a look.


IIRC, the Heinz 57 hole never really had 57 bunkers, they just thought it was a good name.  It did have a few more, short and left off the tee, that the club asked Brian to leave out during the reconstruction, because they were starting to see that not everything could be restored for the budget they had.  [Amazingly, they approved a "restoration" without signing off on enough money to do it all.]  But Brian only left out 6-8 bunkers, not twenty.


I think Hollywood is amazing, but I wouldn't want to have to maintain all those bunkers, either.

[Tom_Doak]

  I played PGA West with the late Bruce Borland once.  His question was, did the visuals on every hole tend to diminish each one of them.  Put another way, would a course with one hole of visuals, i.e., just that one hole at Chart Hills be okay as variety, or would it seem too out of place?  Haven't played there, so it is a legit question?

I only worked on the plans for The Stadium Course at PGA West, but in that time, Mr. Dye never once talked about "visuals" of any sort.  Every feature was there for playability reasons, except for the shrubbery they planted between the holes, I guess.


The holes were intended to look scary, but they looked scary because of features that would punish you for your errors.

[Jeff_Brauer]

TD,


Although I can't recall the hole, the discussion evolved around some huge earth forms well off the golf hole, and they weren't stadium mounds IIRC.  Dick Nugent was walking with us, and said why put them there, they have nothing to do with golf.  Bruce suggested it was because (quoting Billy Crystal SNL character, popular at the time) "because they look mahvellous, dahling."


There is no doubt PGA West is scary, but I always thought it was a departure from either his earlier work and/or eastern work visually.  As always, just MHO.

[Marty Bonnar]

I’m fairly sure there are a few architects who could do with a listen to John Cage.
F.

[Peter Pallotta]

It feels like, in the 100 years since the first golden age courses, the first 75 years were spent adding prescriptive features and enhancing the signifiers, while the next 25 years focused on restoring freedom to the designs by cancelling out and pruning all of that away. It's interesting to think about sociologically as well as architecturally, ie why so many decades of adding rules and constraints and clear signage and rigorous tests, and then why latterly the dramatic about face?

[Tom_Doak]

It feels like, in the 100 years since the first golden age courses, the first 75 years were spent adding prescriptive features and enhancing the signifiers, while the next 25 years focused on restoring freedom to the designs by cancelling out and pruning all of that away. It's interesting to think about sociologically as well as architecturally, ie why so many decades of adding rules and constraints and clear signage and rigorous tests, and then why latterly the dramatic about face?

I am not sure I would make too much of that.  My experience is that every generation has a few designers who try out a new style or look, and a couple of them get noticed, and 50% of the others start copying the new style because it's popular.


Someone trying to sort out "why" I am a minimalist could make up literally hundreds of reasons for it.  Is it because I was at an impressionable age when Watergate happened, and I grew up wanting to question authority?  I think you could make a case that has something to do with my writing, but I am not sure it has anything to do with my design preferences, apart from the fact that I didn't want to do the copy the prevailing trend.

[Ira Fishman]

Yes, to paraphrase Bailyn, we live history forward and assess it backwards.


Ira

[Kyle Henderson]

You can't describe it, you just know it.

Good Jeff. Like class, you know when you see it.

Or like pornography, per Justice Potter Stewart.

[Ken Moum]

  Would Mike Strantz have been like Walter Trout?  Who self describes as too many notes and too loud?  https://youtu.be/cuCFknX9dlQ

But when he sings, there are just the right number...https://youtu.be/cuCFknX9dlQ?t=273


And, for my money, Basie had the right number all the time.  https://youtu.be/5IhfU0pSRYY

[Bruce Katona]

Jeff:

I just read what you wrote and the coffee came flying out:

"  As a landscape architect by training, at my own house, I have to be careful to guard against wanting one of every favorite plant, vs keeping a strong single theme.  And/or, in the case of my current house, where I inherited a nicely done landscape, primarily straight lines and close to formal symmetry, not trying to add "naturalistic" curves that just don't fit the current planting beds."
[/size][/color]
[/size]As and LA like Tom D & you, I'm always guard on for the singular theme - that does not, however, prevent Mrs. K from instructing me on how to plant symmetrically and alternate colors when planting annuals.....what do I know, I only studied this topic in college, the State of NJ says I'm qualified as a professional to practice and have been doing it practically for 40+ years.[/color]
[/size][/color]
[/size]BK[/color]

[Jeff_Brauer]

You can't describe it, you just know it.

Good Jeff. Like class, you know when you see it.

Or like pornography, per Justice Potter Stewart.

More proof that this site needs a thumbs up or up vote/down vote feature!

[Jeff_Brauer]

Jeff:

I just read what you wrote and the coffee came flying out:

"  As a landscape architect by training, at my own house, I have to be careful to guard against wanting one of every favorite plant, vs keeping a strong single theme.  And/or, in the case of my current house, where I inherited a nicely done landscape, primarily straight lines and close to formal symmetry, not trying to add "naturalistic" curves that just don't fit the current planting beds."

As and LA like Tom D & you, I'm always guard on for the singular theme - that does not, however, prevent Mrs. K from instructing me on how to plant symmetrically and alternate colors when planting annuals.....what do I know, I only studied this topic in college, the State of NJ says I'm qualified as a professional to practice and have been doing it practically for 40+ years.

BK

I often use alternate colors in my petunia/vinca or whatever beds.  Mostly because it's hard to find all one color at the typical nursery store unless you get there on day 1 of the planting season......just like you are never quite sure if you are really getting the exact same variety of shrub, tree, etc. that you want, if you are picking for color, shade tolerance, etc.  I do try to go to the more professional nurseries, but in some ways, LA is getting like GCA, in that the nurseries, contractors, etc., often figure their substitute judgment is better than mine, without really knowing my reasons.


At my last house, I lost a tree and the HOA said I had to put back X number of caliper inches, which actually required two trees.  So, I planted those next to the remaining tree in a tight clump, which I considered more natural and better looking, rather than keeping the trees symmetrical.  Every Tom, Dick, and Harry who walked by came up to me (a few ringing the doorbell just to tell me) that I knew nothing of landscaping, and that those trees should be evenly spaced in straight lines to be good design. 

[Bruce Katona]

Jeff:

HAHA!


I just love opinions of those who believe they know all.

[Steve Lang]

  Would Mike Strantz have been like Walter Trout?  Who self describes as too many notes and too loud?  https://youtu.be/cuCFknX9dlQ

But when he sings, there are just the right number...https://youtu.be/cuCFknX9dlQ?t=273


And, for my money, Basie had the right number all the time.  https://youtu.be/5IhfU0pSRYY

Agreed!  And he hit the target notes perfectly, with his orchestra playing as one soul, nothing out of place

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