[Geoffrey Childs]

Jason
Oakland Hills was redsigned by RTJ....moving and adding bunkers. The 16th green at Engineers was redsigned by Tripp Davis...recontouring a green is redsigning it.

Tom Mac

For the record then I'd like to know what you think of teh work Tom Doak did to soften the 11th green at Pasatiempo and the 8th and a couple of others at San Francisco Golf Club?

[Phil_the_Author]

Tom, you answered me with, "When I look at Tilly's career I consider his PGA tour the low point architecturally. Removing thousands of bunkers from coast to coast may have been a needed cost savingd help at a dire time but it was not a proud architectural achievement. I'd put that work in completely different catagory from his serious design and redesign efforts..."

I offered the info about Oakland Hills and Tilly not as a comment on his work during his tour but rather because the implications of your first comment (you were the one to bring up Oakland Hills) was to condemn RTJ for "redesigning" the course as if it were the first time any changes had been made. My point was that Tilly himself viewed his work as merely a tweaking of the course where it SEEMS, and I could be wrong and am seeking clarification on this, that you believe that any changes to a hole or a sufficient number of holes, minor though they might be, constitute a redesign.

Could you please give a definition of the terms redesign and restoration, and where they differ? I think that would be VERY helpful.  

As an example, I believe that changes to a hole CAN be a restoration of it. This is not contradictory. Consider where technology has destroyed the design intent and changed either shot angles or shot values, is not the act of relocating tees and bunkers so as to bring these back an example of restoration through change?

[T_MacWood]

Geoffrey
In the past I've expressed disapointment with both cases...a bad idea and a waste of money IMO. I'm not crazy about the 'restoration' of CPC either.

Phil
When did I condemn RTJ at Oakland Hills...I have consistantly stated that his redesigned course is the high point of OH, in fact I've said in the past I think the club should try re-establish the rugged look the course had shortly after he made the changes.

Redesign is an alteration of a design. Restoration is trying to restore the design.

Its pretty common for golf architects to claim they are re-establishing or restoring lost 'shot values' when they are in the midst of a redsign. We've lost a lot of Tilly and some of his contemporaries original work that way.

Jason
I expressed disapointment in the changes made by Pete Dye to Crooked Stick....I know Tom Doak for one agreed with me. Each case is unique and should be evaluated on its own merits...I know you have little interest in history or the past, but this subject requires some knowledge of the past.

[Tom_Doak]

I stand behind Mr. MacWood on most of these issues.

I think the word "restoration" is being used for a lot of projects which should not be labeled as such.  Moving a tee to bring an old bunker back into play is something I would consider on occasion; moving a fairway bunker from its natural place in the landscape, per Phil Young's example, I have found to be unsuccessful in nine out of ten examples I've seen through the years.  You can't just put a bunker at a certain distance relative to the tee -- it fits into a certain fold in the land, and the original architect has decided which fold that is and placed his tee accordingly.

Geoffrey Childs:  the 7th and 8th greens at SFGC had already been significantly changed by someone years before we got there.  I think my version of the 7th green is the fourth try, after Tillie's original, a flat version after it had been washed out in a flood, and Mr. Tatum's c. 1975 attempt at restoration (based on a single photograph which is all they have).  We did a bit of work to each without changing their character.  Had they been Tillinghast's I don't know if I would have done anything.  We did alter Tillie's original second green, because I was convinced that it would become unputtable with the new grass on the green ... I hated to do that, but they wouldn't go with a different grass.

I did pass on doing any work at Engineers because it had to involve major softening of several noteworthy greens ... I'm sure Trip Davis did a fine job of that, I just didn't want to be the one who erased them.

Joel:

I second your comments but I feel compelled to add that when the outcome of such projects is so much in doubt based on the execution, then maybe they shouldn't be done at all!

[Geoffrey Childs]

Geoffrey Childs:  the 7th and 8th greens at SFGC had already been significantly changed by someone years before we got there.  I think my version of the 7th green is the fourth try, after Tillie's original, a flat version after it had been washed out in a flood, and Mr. Tatum's c. 1975 attempt at restoration (based on a single photograph which is all they have).  We did a bit of work to each without changing their character.  Had they been Tillinghast's I don't know if I would have done anything.  We did alter Tillie's original second green, because I was convinced that it would become unputtable with the new grass on the green ... I hated to do that, but they wouldn't go with a different grass.

I did pass on doing any work at Engineers because it had to involve major softening of several noteworthy greens ... I'm sure Trip Davis did a fine job of that, I just didn't want to be the one who erased them.

Tom

I think that you will find that I have altered my previous and perhaps a bit inflexible stance on these issues. I even at some point I believe apologized for past criticism of your agreeing to alter 11 at Pasatiempo (the modified version which I still have not seen) just because of issues such as the way a club chooses to maintain the green (grass or mowing height). I'd prefer that someone like you go in and remain sensitive to the design intent if greens are to be modified.

Could you please tell me the difference between you going in and modifying the 2nd green at SFGC "because I was convinced that it would become unputtable with the new grass on the green" and Trip Davis going in and modifying the 16th at Engineers (probably for a similar reason as yours).  Why is Engineers a case of "I just didn't want to be the one who erased them" and SFGC or Pasatiempo not ERASING THEM?

[Tom_Doak]

Geoffrey:

The 2nd green at SFGC was pretty much a single, 5-6% slope from back to front.  If the greens got too fast, there were going to be NO hole locations whatsoever.  We reduced the slope by lowering the back of the green (so we wouldn't steepen the approach for bounced-in second shots), to give the green 3/4 as much tilt as it had before.  It was the best approach I could think of.

When I spoke with the green chairman at Engineers, it was pretty clear that he had decided that certain greens had to be changed, and there were a couple of them that I could not imagine changing, without changing their character significantly.  And I thought their character was worth preserving, so we didn't present a proposal for the work.

But, to be honest, the difference between the two is pretty small.  I don't like to alter greens, period ... and I don't want "Quad" Davis to alter any of mine someday.    I wish clubs would just keep them at a reasonable speed instead, but sadly, we architects don't have control over a little detail that makes all the difference.

[Michael Whitaker]

Tom,

Unfortunately, I have not had the opportunity of playing many of your courses... yet! (I'm playing Black Forest in August)

I totally understand your comment about "Quad" not altering your greens, but I have to wonder (without specifics)... looking back on the courses you have built are there not things that you would do differently if you were given the opportunity? Are there not greens or bunkers that you would alter if you had the chance?

[Geoffrey Childs]

Tom

First let me say that I have complete and TOTAL respect for you turning down jobs that you feel are not in keeping with your design philosophy and your respect for the work of our departed architects.  That kind of ethics and honesty is exactly what I would hope that all architects use when choosing work. I commend you for that stance.

I feel really funny trying to defend some changes to classic greens (re:- Engineers) especially when I did not see them before and given my previous stance which was really close to Tom MacWood's.  I need solid reasons why one job is OK and another not and especially given similar requests from members of the clubs.

I have played Apawamis several times (once in a MGA tournament as well) and that Elenor's Teeth green (4th) was beyond one dimensional with a single (goofy) pin location on the front left. Gil Hanse changed the green and I still have to go back and play it to see if it has the "character" intended.  I hope the 10th at Alpine is left alone as I think their 14th green was altered a bit too much (Mark Mungeen did that).

The bottom line from my perspective is that each case is unique.  I don't have the hard line that I used to and I'm willing to give a club a break. I liiked what I saw at Engineers.  Those greens had all the challenge I could want. I wish I had seen them before the work to make a better judgement relative to changing/modifying them.

[T_MacWood]

Tom
What would you estimate a project like Engineers would cost the club - rebuilding 4 or 5 greens, constructing aprox thirty new bunkers plus fees?

[TEPaul]

"Can anybody point out an example of a highly regarded classic or modern architect making a significant change to one of their own designs?
For instance, recontouring a green, adding bunkers, removing bunkers, etc."

Jason:

I'd say sort of on my own golf course (Ross 1916).

Over the years we have three hole by hole master plans. The first one was by Donald Ross himself who came in ten years later (1927) and did a hole by hole recommendation plan where he critiqued most every hole, recommended recontouring a number of greens for various reasons, improving the look and maintennce of various bunkers and recommended adding some bunkering. It's an interestng plan with all handwritten text by Ross and various sketches by him.

Tom MacW;

If your interested in basically going by Hanse at my course it would be something like 40k per green, and about 8K per bunker and tee.

Geoffrey:

As you may know, Apawamis is the home of the USSGA and I loved that Eleanor's Teeth hole. I've never seen anything like it pinnability-wise or otherwise. The thing was sure wide enough to get plenty of pins all across the front of it, I thought. That odd narrow front band of pinnability never looked stressed or beat up to me and I wish they didn't feel they had to change that green. Some of the holes on the front nine of Apawamis have some pretty serious quirk.

[Tom_Doak]

Tom M:  It's hard to put a price on greens reconstruction without knowing exactly what steps they have taken.  We have done them for less than $10,000 apiece (Yeamans Hall, 17 at once, native sand surfaces) to more than $50,000 each (USGA greens in expensive areas).  Throw in the New York factor, and it's easily possible they could have spent $300,000 just on the greens.

Tom P's number for the bunkers is reasonable.

[Geoffrey Childs]

Geoffrey:

As you may know, Apawamis is the home of the USSGA and I loved that Eleanor's Teeth hole. I've never seen anything like it pinnability-wise or otherwise. The thing was sure wide enough to get plenty of pins all across the front of it, I thought. That odd narrow front band of pinnability never looked stressed or beat up to me and I wish they didn't feel they had to change that green. Some of the holes on the front nine of Apawamis have some pretty serious quirk.

Tom - Perhaps I got the same location by chance each time I was there. It is/was a wide green so perhaps it was possible to pin all along the front.  Still, that's very one dimentional. I remember Gil or someone else explaining that green having a few usable tiers in the past that might have been topdressed away over the years.  Maybe Gil restored those tiers based on photos and or talking with old time members who remembered how it used to be contoured. I really did not like that green as it was.  The approach shot is really neat as is the other quirk on that golf course.

[T_MacWood]

Herbert Strong was the pro at Apawamis (1906-1912) when the course went through a redesign and although I have yet to find any direct evidence that he did the work, I think it is likely he did. Strong and quirkiness go hand and hand.

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