It's been stated that Doug Carrick's work has been very regional in scope. Thinking about it, almost all of Canada's golf course designers do regional work.

Carrick and Tom McBroom in the Toronto area (with a few notable exceptions); Les Furber out west; and, Graham Cooke and co. in Quebec and the Maritimes.

I think Ian would agree that this scenario has made for too many courses much too alike in each region. There's not a lot of great variety. At least for my tastes.

Who are some regional guys trying unique things, Ian? That's an excellent question. Of course, I'll be accused of bias, but Rod Whitman in Alberta is my answer!  

Ian:

More power to you if you want to take the opportunity to spend time with your family ... but then why complain about not working in the USA?  Our new border security would soon make you rue the day you took a job here.

There have always been a lot of regional architects for reasons of cost effectiveness and time effectiveness.  When you travel extensively, you spend a lot of your time traveling rather than designing.

However, I have thought that in recent years, the market has gone the other way.  It is hard to keep working in a region once your name is familiar there, because new entries want to market themselves as being different, and they market on the basis of who designed the course.  In fact, regional architects generally miss out on the best sites in their own region, because developers think they need a bigger name to separate themselves from the smaller, successful regional courses.

 

Good point re: Flynn in the Philly area, Ian.

Flynn's brilliance might be attributable to "natural golf architecture". I think he allowed the inherent landscape to dictate golf course design more than many contemporary architects do. Flynn's courses generally exhibit more variety than so many modern creations as a result.  

In  most cases, when too much artificial construction occurs, the potential for true variety is lost. Don't you think?  

David Savic-Columbus, Ohio area

Quote from: A.G._Crockett on August 19, 2004, 09:07:13 PM

Also, Bill Bergin is a terrific young architect who has done several very good courses in Tennessee and Alabama, including the University Club course at Auburn.  He is completing a course in Dothan, AL right now, and is in the process of a Ross restoration in Chattanooga.

AG - Bill Bergin created an outstanding course in upstate SC called Woodfin Ridge. The course is the cornerstone of a real estate development. The owners didn't really know what they had until local golfers discovered the course was a real gem. No one in the area had ever heard of Bergin until he did this course. And, his name is not mentioned on anything... not the scorecard, marketing materials, web site, nothing! The story goes that the developers just wanted a "nice" course to help sell property... what they got was an outstanding layout that has the golf community buzzing. Of all the public access courses in Upstate SC I think Woodfin Ridge has the best layout and design features. I'm dying to know what the budget was for the course. I'll bet this was one big "bang for your buck" project.

What is Bergin's background? Did he apprentice with someone?

Michael,
Bill Bergin was an All-American at Auburn after being a HS golf teammate of Bob Tway in Marietta, GA.  He played professionally for several years, mostly on the European tour, and then apprenticed with Bob Cupp.  He went out on his own several years ago, and has done quite well despite not being well-known.  He is tremendously bright, very studious, and "gets it"!  The University Club course at Auburn is just absolutely terrific; get there if you ever have the chance.

I'm really glad to hear that you liked his work at Woodfin.  I have yet to hear anybody who has played any of his courses say anything else!

BTW, as a player, he won the GA State Open in 1981; I believe that he was the second youngest winner of the event to Bobby Jones.  He just regained his amateur status in Jan., and played in the event last month after a 23 year hiatus!

Although Art Hills is not a regional architect, he has dozens in Naples, FL and has renovated Chevy Chase, Bethesda, and possibly Burning Tree (?) in D.C.

Hills hasn't produced any great courses but he's cranked out scores of courses that are pretty good, and I've never played a Hills course that was bad.

Gene Hamm (possibly the worst architect ever) has quite a few in Myrtle Beach.

AG - Thanks for the info on Mr. Bergin. I will definitely try to visit Auburn's course.

By the way... Do you have any background information on D. J. DeVictor? He is credited with designing Clemson University's "Walker Course." I have searched this site but there is no mention of him and I have found very little of substance with Google.

It's been stated that Doug Carrick's work has been very regional in scope. Thinking about it, almost all of Canada's golf course designers do regional work.

Carrick and Tom McBroom in the Toronto area (with a few notable exceptions); Les Furber out west; and, Graham Cooke and co. in Quebec and the Maritimes.

It's true, I think, that the people who develop golf courses around here in Nova Scotia (at least until recently) tend to look at courses nearby and select as their architect one who did a local course they like. As a result we have a lot of Graham Cooke and Cornish & Robinson designs in the region. Given that (aside from the classic Thompson designs at Highland Links and Digby) a lot of older courses here tended to look like they just happened and didn't have the same sort of "designed" appearance as a Cooke or C&R course, those two firms tended to be seen as a big step up from the alternative of letting somebody who was a friend of the developer (or the developer themselves) put their idea of a course on the site, although that still seems to happen at times.

If my club, Brightwood in Dartmouth, decides to go forward with a relocation, they have already selected Les Furber's firm as the architect following a committee evaluation that also considered (working from faulty memory) Cooke, C&R, and Steve Miller. I understand Furber has done a little work downeast (Glasgow Hills in PEI, any reviews?) but it should be interesting to see how his style differs from the usual suspects here. A web search also showed that his name is associated with renovations to Chester Golf Club in the early-mid 90's, which I was not particularly enamored of, and which I understand have been worked on subsequently by Cooke. We shall see.

Generally the economics in this area cannot justify big-name designers like Nicklaus. Although interestingly enough, a few years ago when I was in a different job I was slightly involved with a group in Cape Breton that was proposing to build a resort course on a reclaimed mine site on the coast in Inverness that could be spectacular if it ever happens. Initially they were proposing Michael Hurdzan as the architect, then somewhere along the way switched to Nicklaus (at least they were throwing his name around). Either would be a first for the area although I don't know how it could ever work out economically. I spoke with Lorne Rubenstein, the golf writer, on the subject at the time and he offered that if I had any influence at all, I should get the developers to speak with Donald Steel, who designed Redtail in the Toronto area. He was very high on Steel and the design although I have subsequently heard some people have a different view of it. Nevertheless, that did not happen and right now I don't know if the project is even proceeding. If not it's unfortunate, if for no other reason than to get some design diversity in the area.

None of the Chicago contingent must've read this thread.

Did Killian and Nugent ever venture far from Chicago?

John Bredemus was an important person in the early days of
Texas golf.  Most notable courses - Colonial and Memorial Park.  Not the most noted architect but he designed many courses across the state and Harvey Penick (I believe) identified him as playing an important role in bringing Golf to Texas.  

Another regional architect was Tom Bendelow.

Tom

Your first two points are valid although I do think your beginning words are a tad much.  My intention is certainly not to harm the regional architects but that  is certainly not why the big names avoid smaller projects. Indeed it is unfortunate if architects can't build on a reasonable budget and that was my point about true talent being able to design with lesser means....

 I do vehemntly disagree though with your comment  "The problem with lowering one's fee is that it's hard to justify to all the rest of your clients."   You may disagree but I hardly think you need to justify your fee to a high end developer if you lower your fees for a muni.  Again, I will make the legal analogy for better or worse that if a top name attorney lowers his fee for a cause he believes in his talents will still be retained by those who trust his abilities.  You are correct that if your name is taken advantage of to make an excessive profit you deserve to share in it.  But could you not negotiate a restriction on green fees, keep it to munis and not developers, etc?  I do not accept that there is so much wrong with my post.  I do believe that we all have an obligation to give back and high end architects could begin by making top public access golf more affordable for the masses but the vast majority choose not to.

Cliff

Cliff:

The other objection I had to your post is your unspoken assumption that we would have better municipal courses if Nicklaus, Jones and Fazio designed them, instead of the architects who are building them now.  Are you sure about that?  If it was your tax dollars at work, would you put your money on those guys?

Municipal projects are hard to generalize ... some of them nowadays seem to go not to the regional architects, but big-name architects with big-dollar goals behind them.  [See the recent posts on the City of LaQuinta's project for one example.]  In fact, it is hard to find a municipality willing to take a chance on a little-known architect who might save them a few hundred thousand dollars ... most go through an RFP process and then choose someone with a "proven track record," even if the record is one of mediocrity.

I don't disagree with your assessment that there are a lot of banal public golf courses in America, but that is more the fault of the second paragraph above, than the lack of big-name designs.

Art Johnson, about 25-30 courses and remodels in southern Wisconsin.  Art is very independent, and not much for the tartan blazer set.  His work is quite "municipal" but functional.  He knows his stuff technically from a construction engineering side, and he knows GCA historically and design principles wise, then usually seems to choose to forgoe much of the design-historical stylizing, and go with something geared to the daily fee or municipal market, and oriented to mid to high handicapper players.  

Homer Fieldhouse has also been a Wisconsin regional designer, who never quite did anything to attract much notice...