KINGTON in the Clouds Pt I

[Sean_A]

Kington was designed in 1925 by "The Illustrious Trinity of Majors".  Namely Majors Hutchinson, Campbell and Hotchkin.  The course rests on Bradnor Hill some 1300 feet high in the county of Herefordshire.  It is said too be the highest course in England.  

A few views of the shared fairways of #s 1 and 18.



Standing on the 1st tee it is immediately apparent that Kington has wide fairways.  A necessity given the weather and terrain.


A well hit, but poorly placed drive leaves this dicey pitch.


The further left, the worse the angle.


The photo shows how narrow the target is.


A sneak preview of the home hole.


The 2nd.  All that brown stuff is fern.  The rough of choice at Kington.


The short 3rd.


The 3rd green from the 4th tee.  As you can see, the green is not a shallow, wide shelf like it appears from the 3rd tee.


The very challenging 4th.  Kington offers a thrilling combination of uphill/blind and downhill tee shots.  


A good drive leaves a 200 yard approach up the hill to a two tier green from left to right.


The tricky 5th.  Sadly, this signals the end of a wonderful beginning to Kington.  There are however, more delights ahead.


The holes canters to the right.  As you can see, the green, like most at Kington, is fairly devoid of contour.  The lay of the land provides plenty of interest!


The approach to the 6th demonstrates one of Kington's primary defenses - the need to control ball flight.


End of part I.

Ciao

[ForkaB]

Thanks, Sean and nice pictures.  Those green sites and hazards look like they came straight out of the Victorian Architecture playbook.  Surely the land is not so uninteresting that they had to resort to creating so many manufactured features?

[Adrian_Stiff]

Rich

I think the site is so severe that the greens had to be bulworked so the game wouldn't become a folly.  The work around the greens certainly looks contrived, but it works very well at Kington.  

Ciao

Looks a very nice old fashioned course Sean, Im suprised I have never heard of it before, although I live 30 minutes from Painswick and hardly anyone from Bristol has played/heard of that.

[Don Dinkmeyer]

Sean - unbelievable - thanks so much. Its posts and pictures like this that put the contributors to this board in a special spot -- in heaven and earth !  

[jeffwarne]

I love those quirky mounds and Victorian era groundworks around the green. (I still love the old photos of The Country Club and primitive mounds and earthworks around greens.)
I'm not sure if I'm open minded enough to accept such a look on a new golf course, but I'd sure like to test myself.

Such a great hazard as it appears you need the right angle in to approach many of the greens.
So much better than sand which is rarely a vertical hazard and only affects the shot if it's short of the target or offline.
Additionally, a lower handicap player has no fear of a greenside bunker, but definitely would think about his approach over and around those mounds.

My guess is those mounds were cheaper to build and are cheaper to maintain as well.

Sand cetainly isn't natural on most courses yet it's rarely criticized particularly if it has a scruffy look and ragged edges
(which are quite often manufactured,especially lately)
Some of the best looking bunkers are in no way natural in actuality or appearance. Neither are tees ,fairways, or greens.

I love those quirky old mounds.

[Tim Copeland]

Sometimes alot of "stuff" is hidden in those mounds

[Tony_Muldoon]

Sean - unbelievable - thanks so much. Its posts and pictures like this that put the contributors to this board in a special spot -- in heaven and earth !  

I'm with Don, thanks for taking he time to post yet another course which has its own special identity and aura.  Now where exactly is Kington?

[Neil_Crafter]

Thanks Sean for posting these pictures. Although I knew about Kington from Tom MacWood's essay on the Three Majors (Golf Architecture magazine Issue 9 2006), I had no idea it looked so much fun! For those of you who have suggested this is Victorian architecture are mistaken in my view - it was designed in 1925 by three distinguished architects in Hutchison, Campbell and Hotchkin who were all disciples of the strategic school. This was their response to building a course on a spectacular but difficult site, with minimal earthworks, The mounds are probably in a lot of cases piles of collected rocks covered with soil - a disposal method that also creates strategic interest. Compare these photos with the regimented, angular look of the Victorian courses - I can't see much if any similarity. Admittedly many of the features are quite severe but they're quirky and must be fun to play. Well done Sean!
cheers Neil

[ForkaB]

Neil (and Sean)

If Kington is anything but just a probably fun course manufactured in a pretty place, then George Bush is the king of strategery.

Even disciples have their bad days.......

[jeffwarne]

Is a "fun" course that's "manufactured in a pretty place" a bad thing?

as opposed to a "not fun" course in an ugly place?

all courses are manufactured

[ForkaB]

Jeff

I was one of the first people on this site to point out that all courses are manufactured.  There are still some poeple here, however, who think otherwise, but not me.  There is, however, a continuum of how "manufactured" a course looks.  To me Kington is at the higher/Victorian end of the scale.  This is netiher good nor bad, just an observation.  I just personally perefer courses that blend better into the natural landscape.  Painswick, for example.

Sean

I do not doubt for a moment that Kington is fun.  All golf is fun.  Vis a vis "Victorian" archtecture, my understanding is that it was and is a perjorative term for overly manufactured looking courses, coined by Wethered, Simpson and others to promote their own ideas about GCA. In that context, Kington looks "Victorian", at least to me, if only from your pictures.  Maybe I'll feel differently when I play it.  For now it doesn't make me want to seek out the other courses of the Three Majors.  That was really the only point I was trying to make.

Cheers

Rich

[T_MacWood]

I don't recall seeing any golf course quite like Kington. I believe its the highest course in Britain. A unique feature of the design...there are no bunkers...instead the architects chose to emphasize the wild terrain. I also find it interesting how they strategically placed the sheep....well done!

[ForkaB]

I still can't get over how you worked the Shrub and Kington into the same sentence!  

Talent is a burden with which I shall always have to live....

[Mark_Rowlinson]

Tom, It's not the highest course in Britain.  That honour belongs to West Monmouthshire.  The 15th tee is, apparently, 1515 feet above sea level.  

[Jason Blasberg]

Wonderful stuff Sean . . . what great terrain!  

I'm looking forward to Part 2 !!

[Mark_F]

Cheers, Sean.

It's much more manufactured, as Rich alluded too, but it reminds me of Southerndown.  Hopefully the first tee is a little further away from the clubhouse, though.

[Philip Gawith]

I think Forka B had a headache when posting under his nom-de-plume.

It is true that some of those green features are manufactured, but there are some very similar features at Huntercombe (I don't have any of the pictures to hand) which is a/the poster-child for the transition from Victorian to strategic architecture. So I am not sure where this leaves us on the continuum of Victorian equals highly manufactured equals bad.

I tend to go with Sean that the mounding was a necessary bulwark against the steep slopes. Huntercombe is interestingly different inasmuch as the mounding is there for the opposite reason - the course is largely flat so in some places the architect (Willie Park) had to contrive interest.

In neither case do i find the mounding disagreeable, but I suppose it is a matter of taste whether you feel the features compliment the natural environment/draw it out, or offend against it. I think Kington is a very natural looking course, greens notwithstanding.

[Rich Goodale]

Philip

ForkaB tells me that poster children are often indistinguishable from sacred cows.  If Kington had been designed by the Three Tenors rather than the Three Majors, would we love it as much?

Rich

[Philip Gawith]

Forka Farnsworth - I like the idea of poster children/sacred cows - though it is difficult to describe something most people have never seen as a sacred cow!

You raise a good point re the Three Tenors - maybe not. But I don't think I have the energy to engage in a discussion of the merits of "blind tasting" of golf courses! That we are biased by names is surely undeniable. I am a brand victim along with most of the rest of us. It is difficult to stay pure in the modern world - but you probably have a better chance from Fife vs London!

[Rich Goodale]

One of the interesting (and frustrating) things about Fife is that it is definitely not in the "modern world."

[Rich Goodale]

Sean

You (and Philip) probably already know that I will love Kington when we play it.  Just don't expect me to fawn over any mentions of the 3 Majors, Willie Park, and/or their links to the Arts and Crafts Movement......

Rich

[Philip Gawith]

Here is one picture of the 7th green at Huntercombe (taken from back left - the entrance is the gap between the mounds) which gives some idea of what I was talking about.

You can see how flat the land is in general, so all else one must assume was the intervention of Willie Park.