http://golfclubatlas.com/courses-by-country/usa/kittansett/Some restorations are more important than others. Perhaps you disagree but when a course occupies an exceptional parcel of land, the stakes are high. Who doesn’t like coastal golf? Answer: no one. Who doesn’t like golf in New England? Again, no one. Add those two elements together and you have Kittansett. Its coastal setting is once again prominent after needed brush and tree clearing and its spectacular holes on the southern end of the peninsula include 2, 3, 16 and 17. Personally, my favorite sustained stretched is the inland bit from 5 through to 13. That’s a vastly different answer than I would have given before.
In the past, I have been slow to praise the course. In 1985, I recall the 3
rd, 4
th, 11
th, and 12
th holes as being standouts and that was about it. Upon revisiting in 2002, I thought enough to do a GCA profile but … actions speak louder than words and I didn’t return until this year. And in 2019, any reservation has been peeled away. In fact, with medium size greens that average 4,683 square feet, and with so many central features (be it in the form of grassed-over rock formations, bunkers and/or interrupted fairways), you have a type design that no one builds any more. My appreciation has skyrocketed to the point where I went once in May and again in October. Walking the course in October’s nor’easter was a particular thrill (!) but it also means I am using Todd Richins' fall photographs, for which I am most grateful.
You can read about the transformation in this updated profile which tracks what Hanse Design has accomplished here over the past 21 years. Basically, they reverted the course back to a design that is blessed with many old-fashioned features. For some, the word ‘old-fashioned’ means out of date but obviously, I am not one of those. Rather, the word ‘old-fashioned’ to me in golf architecture harkens to the days when architects made their courses feature-rich with lots of hurdles of all shapes and sizes to overcome and left it to you to sort out. They didn’t pander to one style of player over another, like some of the modern courses do with insane width. To paraphrase Sherlock Holmes, ‘The game is afoot at Kittansett!’ Players have to hit fairways to hold these medium size greens. The requirement to execute the prior shot well to gain an advantage for the next one is acutely felt, and the design sniffs out who is ‘on’ and who is a bit ‘off’ on any given day.
Don’t get me wrong – the fairways are generally 40+ yards in width so they aren’t narrow/tight like they were in 1985 when I first saw them. However, now the golfer is given the prerequisite room to enter into a match of wits and angles with William Flynn. Wayne Morrison praises the sophisticated use of angles at Kittansett which I didn’t experience in 1985 nor in 2002. Today’s course is a vastly different playing experience, all for the better.
Wayne also notes that Flynn & Toomey’s regular construction team wasn’t employed here. Rather, the owner of the property, Fred Hood, oversaw construction with a team he assembled in 1921. Perhaps for that reason, the course seems to have its own voice with some of the positively most dazzling irregular clumps and mounds in the sport (apart from the famous ones, there is the one back of 8, 40 yards short right of the 12th green, and inside the dogleg on 13 to name three).
Add it all together – diverse property, a feature-rich Flynn design, cool construction techniques employed – and you have something special. Good for it – this is too special an opportunity to not get dialed-in. After all, rollicking land forms were never the star at Kittansett, design features were - and that's precisely where the course once again finds itself, much to the delight of all.
Best,