UK courses built circa 1990 and onwards, How Did Architecture Get So Bad?

[Paul Gray]

The best number to have on a committee is 1.

As soon as you have more you have varied opinions and it means sometimes things are being done as a committee you did not actually like. So whilst you could have two good uns, you might have three bad uns that decide on a vile water feature to celebrate the year 2000. Of course the 3 wise men thought it was brilliant.

BTW at The Players Club we don't have a committee for the purpose of deciding course matters. That is left up to the course manager. The committee decide what the dress format will be for the presentation night and administer the teams and competitions. They would like to have their way and decide what gets done on the course but they don't have the knowledge and the suggestions they make are often for most things are almost child-like and suggest things like getting a cask ale in that would sale 12 pints and waste 24 because of demand, or suggest that the kitchen is opened at 7.00 in the morning or 8.00 at night....this is probably typical of many clubs where an unqualified eye is added to the wizard team.

Exactly. Please explain this to Ryan.

As Harradine said: "A golf club board or green committee should have an odd number of members and three is too many."

Actually, one of the things I feel private clubs could take from the proprietary market is exactly this. Childlike suggestions, or "much like listening to 14 year olds discussing politics" (or words to that effect), is a good analogy. It seems so simple and yet can cause so much ill feeling when you suggest that an expert be used to do a job. If some member with no knowledge of the subject suggested he or she be left in charge of designer a new clubhouse the rest of the membership, quite rightly, would think him or her mad. But apply that same rationale to the course and apparently it's fine.

[Adrian_Stiff]

My answer to the original question was: It was not bad. The anti brigade is a very small fraction. We are going over the same ground on this post. As an architect of anything you design what is required to be the best it could be given the budget, brief and conditions. If it does not work, if it breaks, if it does not fulfil the brief, if its unpopular its a failure. In respect of a golf course if the car park is full then in respect of designing a golf course it isNOT BAD perhaps it is a bit like having a number 1 song lots like and some hate, but really its a bit stupid to say Coldplay are crap when so many people like them.

The ones I have built have been very popular with the exception now of Erlestoke, which in fairness when it opened in 1992 was full up with members with 150 on a waiting list that people paid to be on. Thoulstone at the same time (a few miles away) went bust. Erlestoke later suffered because Cumberwell ate into its 20 minute circle. Erlestoke could have been a lot better but the budget was tiny.

Other new courses in our area have fitted the purpose of supplying a £10 or £15 a round market. Not great courses but they cant all be winners.

I think courses of the 90s will rise highly in the ratings eventually as the old guard die and are replaced by 50 year olds that used to play on the challenge tours etc. A lot of people feel a lot of old golf courses are redundant now purely on length. A lot of 6000 yarders dream of bulking it up to 6500.

[Paul Gray]

Adrian,

And there in a nutshell is the debate and why it can't be resolved: It entirely depends on whether you are judging art or sales? It's the old McDonald's vs Michelin again. Hold on though, I entirely disagree about future rankings. I really don't think the trend is going any which way other than back to classic virtues. But time will tell.

[Adrian_Stiff]

Adrian,

And there in a nutshell is the debate and why it can't be resolved: It entirely depends on whether you are judging art or sales? It's the old McDonald's vs Michelin again. Hold on though, I entirely disagree about future rankings. I really don't think the trend is going any which way other than back to classic virtues. But time will tell.

You keep bringing this up but its not relevant. You want to judge something by YOUR RULES. You are not accepting the major opinion.
We can only disagree Paul because neither of us is going to convince each other. I don't think there is going to be a lot of future golf courses in the UK, but you can disagree. I think that modern technical advancements in the equipment will make a mockery of short golf courses, but you can disagree on that point if you wish. I see more and more people hitting it further, again you can disagree. I already hear people not wanting to play golf courses because they are too short and that includes some of ones that were up there 10-15 years ago, so I think that barrier is more likely to higher and sub 6500 will get poo-pooed and considered a minus by the next wave of golf rates 20 years from now.

How do you judge a piece of art? Is not the high price that artists work commands at auction a fair line of success? If so should a £75 green fee be a better course objectively than a £8 one. Objective ranking may not be possible but a minor subjective one (because you know better) over the major opinion.....Think about it your wrong yours is not definitive. It is just another opinion. What you really want to do (and me as well because I do actually like the same things as you) is change the way golf is played today.

[Sean_A]

To be fair to Adrian, what else is he meant to judge success on?  He is an architect in business to build courses which make money...so success is money.  

That said, I disagree that the courses of the 90s will see their day in terms of critical success.  There can be no doubt that a great percentage of these courses are "fad" driven an not designed for critical longevity.  For the most part, the modern courses which are displacing some classic courses on the lists are of the classic design mould, extremely beautiful and/or on turf which will support the highest class of golf.  The lack of good turf, on course aesthetics and charm will always be a hinderance even for the modern courses which do have credibility as challenging courses. Of course, much of the time when moderns grab this spotlight it is because there is a dearth of suitable classics in the area...and if there are some reasonable candidates...and there is money to be had due to marketing as a host club, then many classics can ratchet up the difficulty of their courses...that ain't hard to do. The much bigger challenge is how to increase difficulty without sacrificing charm and playability.  

Sorry Adrian, I think we have already seen the rankings largely pass over the 90s for the newer high profile courses built on more of a classic platform.   There are probably about a dozen 90s courses in the top 100 and of those I would say about half are either very pretty an or on excellent turf.  We are looking at maybe six courses from the 90s built inland on less than ideal turf which are top 100 and only Loch Lomond really challenges some of the very best courses in GB&I for a high spot.  All the others are making up the numbers in the bottom half.  Exactly which courses are going to rise to suden prominence?      

Ciao      

[Paul Gray]

Adrian,

And there in a nutshell is the debate and why it can't be resolved: It entirely depends on whether you are judging art or sales? It's the old McDonald's vs Michelin again. Hold on though, I entirely disagree about future rankings. I really don't think the trend is going any which way other than back to classic virtues. But time will tell.

You keep bringing this up but its not relevant. You want to judge something by YOUR RULES. You are not accepting the major opinion.
We can only disagree Paul because neither of us is going to convince each other. I don't think there is going to be a lot of future golf courses in the UK, but you can disagree. I think that modern technical advancements in the equipment will make a mockery of short golf courses, but you can disagree on that point if you wish. I see more and more people hitting it further, again you can disagree. I already hear people not wanting to play golf courses because they are too short and that includes some of ones that were up there 10-15 years ago, so I think that barrier is more likely to higher and sub 6500 will get poo-pooed and considered a minus by the next wave of golf rates 20 years from now.

How do you judge a piece of art? Is not the high price that artists work commands at auction a fair line of success? If so should a £75 green fee be a better course objectively than a £8 one. Objective ranking may not be possible but a minor subjective one (because you know better) over the major opinion.....Think about it your wrong yours is not definitive. It is just another opinion. What you really want to do (and me as well because I do actually like the same things as you) is change the way golf is played today.

Well you're right to say that I'm judging things by my rules, just as everyone else is. The one thing I'm not judging them by is sales though. You can't judge art by sales. You confuse the two when you refer to high art prices and success in the same sentence. So you can judge your success as a businessman in sales but not your success as an artiste.

Of course length is an issue but I don't see extended RTJ courses or The Belfry suddenly dominating the rankings as a consequence. You may disagree but Sunningdale below Celtic Manor? Really? I don't see history being kind to the courses of the late 20th century but we can disagree about that. You may think Pinehurst was a flash in the pain but I think it was the start of a very significant change in attitudes which will filter its way down over the next 20+ years. And regarding architecturally outstanding shorter courses, The Swinley Forests if you like, I honestly think that a point will come when people realise that equipment has to be reigned in and I honestly think the current minimalist movement, still in its infancy to most of the golfing world by embracing places such as Swinley, will be the movement which ushers it in. We can't just keep using more land in a word with ever diminishing water reserves.

[Duncan Cheslett]

I already hear people not wanting to play golf courses because they are too short and that includes some of ones that were up there 10-15 years ago, so I think that barrier is more likely to higher and sub 6500 will get poo-pooed and considered a minus by the next wave of golf rates 20 years from now.

I can understand the possibility of this happening, but is it really realistic to think that average club golfers are going to consider 6500 yard courses 'too short'?

Sure, your Cat 1 golfers maybe, but average 45-70 year-old 9-18 handicappers who make up the bulk of the golfing fraternity and pay most of the bills? I don't hear many of these guys crying out for longer courses.

I enjoy playing a long 'championship' course occasionally. Would I want to play one twice a week?  No way!

A well-designed 6000 yards on interesting ground is quite enough for me day to day. I suspect that most club golfers would concur.

Could part of the problem be that nearly all courses built in the last 25 years are proprietary clubs dependent to a large degree on attracting one-off fee-paying visitors, and have to play up the 'bling' factor to succeed at the detriment of being a 'good' course by our standards here?