Capability Brown vs Gertrude Jekyll

[T_MacWood]

Neil:

I sure hope others don't look at a thread or subject like this as some tete-a-tete between Tom MacWood and I over the A/C movement. The fact of a Capability Brown and what he produced in his career and how it may later have at least related to some of the sites that were prevalently used for golf courses is a truly serious subject in the context of the evolution of golf course architecture. The fact that Brown's career (and life) was over well before man-made golf architecture even began is also interesting.

The fact that A/C proponents either in the Victorian era, or today (like a Tom MacWood) believed he did landscape architecture some disservice (in a naturalistic sense) is not particularly apropos of the man's importance in the over-all context of landscape architecture's eventual effect on golf course architecture, particularly in the 20th century.

TE
This is what Sir Roy Strong (art historian and garden historian) wrote about Lancelot 'Capablity' Brown: "Beautiful though 'Capbility' Brown's landscapes strike us today, he was the 'great destroyer' of England's formal garden heritage. Even in his own time it is difficult to find much written in his favour."

'Whole woods have been swept away to make room for a little grass and a few American weeds. Our virtuosi have scarcely left an acre of shade, nor three trees growing in a line, form Land's End to the Tweed, and if their homour for devistation continues to rage much longer there will not be a forest-tree left standing in the whole Kingdom. ~~ Sir William Chambers 1772

[TEPaul]

"TE
This is what Sir Roy Strong (art historian and garden historian) wrote about Lancelot 'Capablity' Brown: "Beautiful though 'Capbility' Brown's landscapes strike us today, he was the 'great destroyer' of England's formal garden heritage. Even in his own time it is difficult to find much written in his favour."


Tom MacWood:

Yes, that is most definitely true---eg many accused Capability Brown of destroying many of the highly formal English gardens that preceded his career.

That English garden style that preceded Brown could be categorized generally as an Augustan style (a highly formal design essentially deriving from Rome and named for the Roman Emperor Augustus).

Lancelot "Capability" Brown's primary innovation in landscape design was to create what's become know as the "Serpentine" style. Brown is generally given credit for inventing this style of landscape design (generally on some really massive size and scale). The intent of it was clearly to create far more naturalism in landscape design than the highly formal style of the Augustan type that preceded him.

For this he certainly was criticized by those who favored that highy formal early English landscape design style (Augustan), and some today who favor that design still apparently criticize him for destroying that highly formal style.

The superme irony is that the A/C contingent also criticize Brown for a type of design that wasn't NATURAL ENOUGH LOOKING!!  

This is probably precisely the reason that the likes of Gothein and Hussey wrote to rehabilitate Brown's reputation in the 1920 and 1930s----eg they realized his style was definitely somewhere between the highly formal Augustan style that preceded him and the highly naturalized style of the A/C movement of designers such as Gertrude Jekyll that followed about 100 years after Brown's death.

But the interesting thing to me in how landscape architecture may have been applied to golf course architecture and how Capability Brown's style may have been much later applied to golf course architecture (since his life preceded the beginning of a more naturalistic form of golf course architecture by well over a century) is that if one looks at the drawing plans of most of Capability Brown's "Serpintine" style it looks remarkably similar to the drawing plans of many of the world's golf holes and golf courses. In a general sense this fact is fairly undeniable--that is if one has eyes and half a brain.

And then if one takes those drawing plans of Brown's "Serpentine" style and the drawing plans of many golf holes and golf courses (particularly their routings) and looks to see what went on the ground from all those drawing plans one also sees some remarkable similarities between Brown's style of landcape design and golf course design (particularly golf course routings). Maybe it's all just coincidental but somehow I doubt it, particularly seeing as so many golf courses where eventually built on Brown's style of "park" designs.

[TEPaul]

"'Whole woods have been swept away to make room for a little grass and a few American weeds. Our virtuosi have scarcely left an acre of shade, nor three trees growing in a line, form Land's End to the Tweed, and if their homour for devistation continues to rage much longer there will not be a forest-tree left standing in the whole Kingdom. ~~ Sir William Chambers 1772"

Yes, Tom MacWood, and if Sir William were alive today he'd probably be an inveterate "tree hugger" and violently opposed to the removal today of any of the numerous trees that have choked most of our classic golf courses in the last fifty years.  

[T_MacWood]

Tom MacWood:

Yes, that is most definitely true---eg many accused Capability Brown of destroying many of the highly formal English gardens that preceded his career.

That English garden style that preceded Brown could be categorized generally as an Augustan style (a highly formal design essentially deriving from Rome and named for the Roman Emperor Augustus).

Lancelot "Capability" Brown's primary innovation in landscape design was to create what's become know as the "Serpentine" style. Brown is generally given credit for inventing this style of landscape design (generally on some really massive size and scale). The intent of it was clearly to create far more naturalism in landscape design than the highly formal style of the Augustan type that preceded him.

For this he certainly was criticized by those who favored that highy formal early English landscape design style (Augustan), and some today who favor that design still apparently criticize him for destroying that highly formal style.

The superme irony is that the A/C contingent also criticize Brown for a type of design that wasn't NATURAL ENOUGH LOOKING!!  

This is probably precisely the reason that the likes of Gothein and Hussey wrote to rehabilitate Brown's reputation in the 1920 and 1930s----eg they realized his style was definitely somewhere between the highly formal Augustan style that preceded him and the highly naturalized style of the A/C movement of designers such as Gertrude Jekyll that followed about 100 years after Brown's death.

But the interesting thing to me in how landscape architecture may have been applied to golf course architecture and how Capability Brown's style may have been much later applied to golf course architecture (since his life preceded the beginning of a more naturalistic form of golf course architecture by well over a century) is that if one looks at the drawing plans of most of Capability Brown's "Serpintine" style it looks remarkably similar to the drawing plans of many of the world's golf holes and golf courses. In a general sense this fact is fairly undeniable--that is if one has eyes and half a brain.

And then if one takes those drawing plans of Brown's "Serpentine" style and the drawing plans of many golf holes and golf courses (particularly their routings) and looks to see what went on the ground from all those drawing plans one also sees some remarkable similarities between Brown's style of landcape design and golf course design (particularly golf course routings). Maybe it's all just coincidental but somehow I doubt it, particularly seeing as so many golf courses where eventually built on Brown's style of "park" designs.

TE
This why you should probably expand your knowledge base beyond what you find on the Internet. You are correct the aesthetic period proceeding Brown was called Augustan, however its gardens were not formal. William Kent, the father of the English Landscape School and Brown's mentor, produced the most famous garden designs during this period. His gardens were naturalistic but he liked to spiced things up with a classic feature here and there (temples, grottos, etc).

The gardens Lancelot Brown destroyed were from much earlier period...the middle ages. These are the vernacular gardens that were admired by Jekyll and Sackville-West, and are admired by Lloyd and Strong today.

William Chambers followed Brown. He wrote an influential disertation on Chinese gardens. As you proabably know (from your Internet research) Brown's gardens were referred to as Beautiful, the period Chambers was part of was called the Picturesque...he and his cronies took up a notch or two.

Based on your strong knowledge of 18th C garden design and your strong Internet capabilities (no pun intended) I'm certain you will have no problem with my London questionaire, which will test your knowledge of turn of the century golf architecture and the society it sprang from. I have feeling your knowledge of this period is on par with your knowledge of 18th C. landscape design.

[paul cowley]

TomPaul....I think you have discovered the time line to the first LAarch who might have muddled with the Game and its design....old Capability himself!.
I think this is important because its really the crux of this ongoing debate.....let me try to elaborate.

AD?....Golf [the Game] begins as a form of recreation played over an existing landscape and rules develop, largely in response to the landscape and how one has to play over it. I like to think of those persons who laid out the course and provided for the rules as the first Keepers of the Game [the Keepers].

AD soon thereafter.....someone decides to place a bench for rest purposes or maybe just to be able to watch the play and enjoy the day from a good vantage point. I like to think of this person as the first Landscape Designer [or LA] to begin to affect elements of the Game.

AD next.....a position develops for a person to be responsible for the conditions and upkeep of the playing areas ...the Keeper of the Green [the KG].

AD along and along.....between wars and pestilence, wealthier classes emerge  that outgrow thier organised castle gardens or farm plots and they start to demand more visual and esthetic control over their environment and their sense of space....enter Capability and associates [LA's].

AD moving forward....the Game increases in popularity and there is pressure to export it to areas outside its origins and to terrain that is differnt. The Keepers and the GK's try to adapt the physical and strategic elements of the Game to these different locations with little initial success....but, as Man is wont to do when confronted with a challenge, he begins to adapt his environment to better suit his needs.
And the Game continues to grow outside its origins, primarily because of the Keepers and the KG's ability to meld agronomic and engineering methods to these differing sites.
Concurrently, Capability and Associates [LA's ] are utilizing similar methodologies to create and construct their visions of how man relates and exists in his physical environment... and both groups projects are being increasingly fueled by a wealthy patronage.

AD getting closer...somewhere in an open pasture or field the Keepers and the LA's encounter each other, not just once but on a repeating basis, as for the most part both of these groups are using similar land and patrons to achieve their goals.
A cautious calm ensues as the groups strive to measure and understand each other. Most of the LA's don't play the Game but feel there are similarities in what they are trying to achieve. The Keepers start to get nervous when one of the LA's suggests planting a tree or two to help visual organisation and improve site lines and vistas.

AD not long ago....more and more LA's are getting involved in the Game, although many have no real understanding of its intricacies as most don't play, but they come armed for its layout with templates that have been provided for them in the schools where they have been taught to plan for golf as part of an larger environment....and they also want to beautify the courses and add additional plantings to do so.
....and many of the Keepers are getting very nervous.

AD now......A cautious calm still exists between the two groups, nowhere better exemplified than between the two main protagonists of this threads monumental debate.
Was Capability really among the first of those standing in that field?...we will never know....but I think TomP might be right in his suspitions.....and in the very least it might add some new light to one of the murkier chapters in the ongoing historical sagas of Jeykll versus Brown and the A/C Chronicals.

I love History because it really becomes simple in its simplicity....you know what I mean?

[TEPaul]

Tom MacWood:

With your post #53 I doubt you could possibly play the part of the intellectual snob any better, but that's generally what real dilettantes do. Kent, Chambers, Strong etc---what's the point of you mentioning them? Is it just to name drop again, so it might sound like you actually understand this subject? This is about Brown and his career and how his style may've related later to golf course architecture. Clearly your understanding of Lancelot Brown is pretty weak. That's too bad seeing as what his place is in the history of English landscape architecture, and as it may've related to golf course architecture later.

[TEPaul]

Paul:

I like that colloquial chronicle of yours a lot and who could really deny the evolution of it all probably happened just about that way? That's the way of evolution and certainly in the way golf migrated out of Scotland initially.

Some of these chaps on here wonder how some of those rudimentary geometric golf features could've happened on some of the original English inland sites, and probably initially on some of Lancelot Brown's massive Serpentine style "park" estates.

They don't seem to understand just how simple golf was back then. They think what first happened with golf architecture in England was some conscious departure from the natural model of the linksland.

Obviously they're forgetting or failing to realize that even the linksland at that point had not really experienced much man-made architecture. So noone, even in the old country knew much of it anyway.

As Macdonald said, when golf first migratated out of its centuries old home initially they took the letter of the game out and sort of neglected to recognize how they'd left the "spirit" of it behind.

And as Behr said they took the playing field of golf to other parts unfamiliar with it and they failed to see they left the essence of the playing field behind. And why would they have known back then what the essence of the linkslands really meant to golf?  So they put it on relatively uninteresting open inland sites ill suited to it, particularly agronomically. And they put it on their aristocratic "parks" landscaped by the likes of Capability Brown perhaps a century previous that probably weren't that ill-suited to it because of what he'd done a hundred years before. The "parkland" site style was born to golf architecture.

Why did the actual man-made features of that early golf architecture (Victorian or geometric design) begin to change inland in England and such toward the end of the 1890s and beginning the new century? Well, obviously after a couple of decades of what Darwin termed "steeplechase" courses they came to realize what they had wasn't much and so they began to cast their eyes back to that wonderful links land where it all began hundreds of years before, and they obviously came to understand the essence of it all, and that if they couldn't actually have it they would be better to try to really imitate it.

At that point the construction techniques of actual golf architectural features began to try to diligently imitate that which was almost wholly natural and unman-made back in the old country.

Did golf architecture at that early point even have an applied "aesthetic" characteristic that was made in conjunction with the creation or even erection of the golf architectural features?

Not really.

Enter the first applications on golf course architecture of landscape architecture's "art" principles of Harmony, Balance, Rhythm, Proportion and Emphasis.

[TEPaul]

Now, let's look at Gertrude Jekyll's landscape garden model. Generally they were immediately attached to rustic country houses with a riot of indigenous natural vegetation (the "wild garden" style) with meandering little pathways about three feet in width. Most of these Jekyll "cottage" gardens were about half the size of a shortish par 3 compared to Lancelot Brown's Serpentine style "park" landscape architecture which in some cases could've been as large as numerous golf courses.

But perhaps Tom MacWood's contention that golf course architecture is influenced by A/C or Jekyll's landscape style may lay in our future.

If the USGA and their "Open" mentality keeps narrowing fairway width and growing a dense riot of rough on either side, one of these days "Open" fairways will look like the three foot wide paths of a Gertrude Jekyll "Wild Garden" with a riot of indigenous vegetation on either side.  

But until that day comes MacWood's assumptions and conclusions on the influence of a Jekyll or A/C landscape architecture on GCA is historical revisionism at close to its finest.

[paul cowley]

TomP.....its interesting to me that my stance in this debate is founded less on research, but more on the forensic 'feelings' of a designer....my earlier West Side Story colloquiy being a weak but heartfelt attempt to express this.

I don't feel that early parallels between GCarch and any prevailing 'styles' of that time were any more than that...parallels....and not any more relevant than the  present 'movements' or LAarch 'styles' of today and the current GCarchitecture being built.

...its just something or other about hindsight being easy.

[TEPaul]

"I don't feel that early parallels between GCarch and any prevailing 'styles' of that time were any more than that...parallels...."

Paul:

I have little doubt that's true.

On the other hand, can you imagine what poor Capability would've thought if he could've woken up a century later and seen those golf courses on his grand landscape architectured English parks? He probably would've shrieked; "What are these idiots doing batting fossilized marshmellows around with sticks in my Serpentiniums?"

[T_MacWood]

Tom MacWood:

With your post #53 I doubt you could possibly play the part of the intellectual snob any better, but that's generally what real dilettantes do. Kent, Chambers, Strong etc---what's the point of you mentioning them? Is it just to name drop again, so it might sound like you actually understand this subject? This is about Brown and his career and how his style may've related later to golf course architecture. Clearly your understanding of Lancelot Brown is pretty weak. That's too bad seeing as what his place is in the history of English landscape architecture, and as it may've related to golf course architecture later.

Now, now, no need for name calling. Correct me if I'm wrong (and you have not corrected a single point I've made about 18th C landscape design) but I think you were the one who has been corrected....again and again. Your knowledge of the English Landscape movement is based on what you can discern on the Internet and therefore is a little sketchy, as I suspect is your knowledge of turn of the century golf architecture.

The questionaire is still waiting for you...I don't blame you for not trying to tackle it.

[T_MacWood]

Now, let's look at Gertrude Jekyll's landscape garden model. Generally they were immediately attached to rustic country houses with a riot of indigenous natural vegetation (the "wild garden" style) with meandering little pathways about three feet in width. Most of these Jekyll "cottage" gardens were about half the size of a shortish par 3 compared to Lancelot Brown's Serpentine style "park" landscape architecture which in some cases could've been as large as numerous golf courses.

But perhaps Tom MacWood's contention that golf course architecture is influenced by A/C or Jekyll's landscape style may lay in our future.

If the USGA and their "Open" mentality keeps narrowing fairway width and growing a dense riot of rough on either side, one of these days "Open" fairways will look like the three foot wide paths of a Gertrude Jekyll "Wild Garden" with a riot of indigenous vegetation on either side.  

But until that day comes MacWood's assumptions and conclusions on the influence of a Jekyll or A/C landscape architecture on GCA is historical revisionism at close to its finest.

May I suggest you re-read this thread from beginning to end. No one has suggested the A&C garden was the model for turn of the century golf architecture. What Brad Klein suggested was A&C theory was disseminated by the widely popular writing of A&C gardeners like Jekyll. Your confusion (and complete ignorance) about the A&C movement and its broad influence never fails to amaze.

[TEPaul]

"The questionaire is still waiting for you...I don't blame you for not trying to tackle it."

Tom MacWood:

It is? where is it? And what is it for? Is it something you now think you should produce since you're a frustrated history teacher who isn't capable of being that? Perhaps you should try to learn a few things about that age from the head of the history dept at Brown U who is the webmaster of the VictorianWeb. I think he probably knows a whole lot more about that age than you do or ever will. If you even knew 1% of the information on the Internet on this subject you'd be a whole lot farther along than you are in what you know. Your lack of understanding of Lancelot Brown and his significance to English landscapre architecture seems really pathetic. Isn't it interesting how so much of his work has remained and been preserved on some of the most famous country estates and "parks" (massive English country estates) in England? But maybe you think they should all be turned into some form of an A/C or Gertrude Jekyll "wild cottage garden" in the future.

[TEPaul]

"What Brad Klein suggested was A&C theory was disseminated by the widely popular writing of A&C gardeners like Jekyll. Your confusion (and complete ignorance) about the A&C movement and its broad influence never fails to amaze."

Is that what Brad Klein said? Funny, that's not what he said to me when I spoke with him for about an hour following this.  

I've never denied that A/C gardening and Jekyll were popular in England for a time. So was Capability Brown in his time or how could he've been considered perhaps the most significant landscape designer in English landscape design history?

Your problem is you just keep trying to make this connection that since A/C landscape design enjoyed a period of popularity in England that it must have therefore had a powerful influence on golf course architecture and practicially every other phase of artistic life too.

Most discerning people would tell you, Tom MacWood, that that kind of logic without something truly significant or distinct to point to in golf course architecture that connects it to A/C or Jekyll is simply a massive stretch on your part.

Your constant contention that this must be so because the A/C movement was not a style or a movement but a "philosophy" that swept the world of art forms and disciplines is just a load of crap. You should know you aren't going to be able to convince anyone who has some working knowledge of the history of landscape architecture or with half a brain of that logic or fact but for some reason you seem to continue to try.

And that's what discerning people, including Brad Klein, have been telling you. But I doubt you'll ever figure it out.

Furthermore, Brad Klein freely admits he knows very little about English landscape design or its history, at this point, but after speaking with him about it it sure seems to me he's interested now. The explanation of Brown's Serpentine "park" style and how that may've eventually influenced golf course architecture seemed to make perfect sense to him, not the least reason being I was able to provide him with so many significant and distincts examples of it in golf course architecture's evolution. Let's see you do that with Jekyll and the A/C movement other than this rationalization that it was because it was a "philosophy" that prevaded almost everything.

He feels that a very well organized forum on the effects of various forms of landscape architecture on golf course architecture would be an appropriate thing to have and I couldn't agree with him more. In a forum like that the obvious fact of the "parkland" style of a Capability Brown on the "parkland" golf course setting that evolved from it is undeniably significant to golf course architecture's evolution.

But the only response you seem to be able to come up wth regarding Brown and his significant English landscape architecture style is that some of the A/C proponents panned Brown about 75 years after the fact.

If A/C was as dominant and popular and all pervasive as you claim it was, then let me ask you again, why is it that so many of Lancelot Brown's "park" estates are still so famous, still exist, and are so well preserved?  

Does that sound like a landscape designer who has been eternally panned?  

Not to me it doesn't. If you call that no understanding the history of English landscape design style on golf course architecture, then so be it.  

Frankly, you're so damn dense or obdurate that you can't even admit the influence of steeplechasing on early English golf architecture when one of golf and architecture's finest observers, Bernard Darwin, pointed it out. You're only response was that you know Darwin so well you are convinced he must have been joking. It's becoming clearer every day the joke is not Darwin's----the joke is you.

[T_MacWood]

TE
Its post #49. It will measure your turn of the century aptitude. Take your time. I think you should be able to get most of them just based on your fabulous Internet research capabilities.

[Tommy_Naccarato]

While this discussion is always intresting, sometimesa it can get a bit personal and to take a verse, or steal it from one of the great landscape architects of Los Angeles, Rodney King, whose constituients, upon hearing the verdict of the law enforcement officiers that tried to beat his head in--decided to further "architect" or redesign the entire Los Angeles area:

Why can't we all get along? ? ?

Right now I'm working at Santa Anita Racetrack. It's an experience that I can only describe as eye opening in terms of every aspect of my life.

On top of the hill at the famed racetrack which horses like Seabiscuit, Kayak II, Silky Sullivan, John Henry and many other made their fame is one of the most glorious area filled with oaks and other fauna. This area is walking back into time because it is untouched by man. It's the same scene that sparked the Arts & Crafts movement of Pasadena, less then five miles away. A trip through this area will echo the scenes of what George Thomas, Billy Bell, William Watson, John Duncan Dunn and probably most important in terms of conveying the point, Max Behr worked with in creating their golf architecture. It's amazing how each of their styles differed, but still managed to grasp and work with the land--the very thing which was inspired by the blueprint for it all-The Nature of it all-THE GREAT LINKS.

While some of the above names may have or may not have gotten it and it's relation to architecture of the period, the influence of that time of that architecture had to have an affect because that's what the Green Brothers relied upon--Nature.

It's also distressing to see what has become of the California environment.

[TEPaul]

Tom MacWood:

A few of these are excellent questions and I most certainly don't mind addressing them;

"TE
How does the term 'golden age of golf architecture' clearly suggest what was going on in London at the turn of the century?"

Tom MacWood:

I don't necessarily feel that the so-called "Golden Age of Golf Architecture" needs a '"term" or a label" that clearly suggests either what it was or what the primary or most powerful influences on it were. And I sure don't think it needs a term that clearly suggests what was going on in London at the turn of the century. Maybe a good term for what was going on it London around the turn of the century would be; "What was happenin' in London around the turn of the century."

To truly understand golf architecture and its most powerful influences one probably doesn't need some "term"---all one needs to do is simply look into its histories and evolution and just understand it and what they were.

One thing I certainly do know is that it does not need the term "Arts and Crafts Golf" attached to it by someone like you who clearly does not know or accurately understand what the most powerful influences on the so-called "Golden Age" of golf architecture were, despite the fact that it's most powerful influences have already been long recorded by many of those who understood it best.

That's a large part of your problem, in my opinion---eg you think you can act the part of the legitimate historian regarding this age by coming up with something heretofore undetected. Only problem with that is that you tried it and pretty much completely failed the exegeses of others who understand the influences on golf architecture at that time a lot better than you do.

"Do you think golf architecture is considered today a legitimate art form? I don't and I think that is a problem that needs to be addressed."

That is a really good question, really good. Excellent, matter of fact.

And I don't know the answer to that. First of all, if golf course architecture is to be considered an art form, I suppose one should ask what the parameters of the term "art" or "art form" mean, and particularly as the term relates to golf course architecture.

I think I am inclined to think that golf course architecture is an art form or at least a very unique form of art. Why would I say it could be a very unique form of art if it is indeed to be considered art or an art form at all?

Simply because golf course architecture seems to me to serve such a different purpose. And obviously that is as a playing field of a sport or as some are wont to mislabel it---a game. Does a tennis court where the "game" of tennis is conducted need to be considered an art form? Does a baseball diamond on which the "game" of baseball is conducted need to be considered an art form? Or a football field? Does the beautiful natural stream in which the "sport" of salmon fishing is conducted need to be considered an art form? Or the Scottish moor across which man hunts grouse and game? Is Nature herself, unadorned, an "art" form?

However, in this particular context I almost completely subscribe to all the philosophical theories of Max Behr. I have little doubt there was anyone who ever came within shouting distance of looking into all the philosophical or even pyschological ramifications of golf and golf course archtiecture, including both if and how it might be considered an art form like he did.

It's a shame you don't know much about him or his theories and philosophical ideas about golf and golf course architecture. I can guarantee you they were ALL a lot more important to understanding golf course architecture and all the essences of it, nuances of it, and influences upon it, than it is to understand the "Arts and Crafts" Movement or what was going on around London at the turn of the century.  

The question of whether it actually is considered an art form, though, or needs to be, is what interests me most. That's why I just puts some posts on here posing that basic question. And that is because I truly do wonder whether golf course architecture really needs something like landscape architecture applied to it. What if it wasn't? What if it never had been? Would golf course architecture be better off or worse off for it?

That to me is the real question. What is landscape architecture anyway, but basically a visual aesthetic? What purposes does it serve? I think we pretty much know what they are. Does golf or golf architecture really need that? Obviously many think so, probably most do. But I continue to wonder.

On one thing, Tom MacWood, you and I may agree and probably always have. I believe, as I think you've said you do, that Nature herself when it comes to golf or even its architecture may not really need to be improved upon or idealized, at least not to the extent that's generally been done. It only needs to be fitted somewhat to the few necessities of the game of golf, and I think we all pretty much know what they are. If it becomes otherwise, or too much otherwise, then golf itself begins to lose Nature itself as that essential part of the balance of what golf is supposed to be. This was the underpinning of Behr's philosophy on golf and golf architecture. This is why he made the distinction between a sport and a game. To him a sport had a necessarily heavy reliance on Nature herself while a game was merely some highly defined playing field solely for the purpose of isolating as much as possile a competitor's skill against another human competitor.

"Despite its own inferiority complex golf architecture has been - and is - effected by the same aesthetic influences as the other arts. This was especially true in London at the turn of the century - evidently you  disagree."

Again, as you can tell from what I just saod above, I am certainly not completely convinced of that. You talk about aesthetic influences or the same aesthetic influences as other art forms, particularly those art forms that concerned those in and around London at the turn of the century. What are they that are so necessary to golf architecture or great golf architecture? What was the matter with TOC for the hundreds of years as man played golf over it before any man-made feature was really applied to it?

Was that raw and beautifully rugged land that happened to be almost perfectly fitted to golf by only Nature herself an "aesthetic art form"?

If so, of course I'd say golf course architecture should be considered an art form, and its best practioners considered as artists. And I might even say that a golf architect as a utilizer of Nature or an interpreter of Nature and natural formations that must be fitted to golf, and his excellent artificial copies of them, just may be a sublme art form and he a sublime artist too, particularly seeing as his medium is so vastly different from the medium of any other artist or art form in the world.

"Your confusion (and complete ignorance) about the A&C movement and its broad influence never fails to amaze."

Tom MacWood:

You should know something. I am in no way confused or ignorant about the A&C movement. I simply disagree with you about how broad its influences were generally and its powerful influence on the Golden Age of golf architecture.

There is a difference between the two and a very big one but obvously you haven't figured that out yet.

Apparently you have yet to understand that someone who has given all kinds of good and factual reasons why he disagrees with some far-fetched point you are trying to make is not necessarily confused or igonorant.

[Tommy_Naccarato]

I disagree completely.

I think Max Behr embraced his architecture in the same vein as the Green Brothers did their's. In fact, since I'm working not far from where Max lived in Pasadena, I'll try to stop by there soon and get an image of what his house looked like.

My guess is it was probably a Craftsman-style bungalow which given the zest of his advertisements for his services in golf course architecture was everything about style and substance of the Craftsman movement.

I know when my friends Geoff shackelford and Gil Hanse were doing Rustic Canyon, they went over to Pasadena and took the Craftsman home tour at lleast one time. Geoff I know was over there several times. If that isn't influence in architecture well then your kidding yourself just to prove a point.

[TEPaul]

Tommy:

What the hell are you disagreeing with?

What am I talking about in that post above but Nature? What was Behr talking about really regarding golf course architecture but the understanding and appreciation of both how to use Nature herself unaltered and if that could not serve golf properly then imitating the landforms of Nature as well as a man could do that? What Behr was after is that golf and golf architecture should maintain that important balance with Nature in all that it and it's playing fields were.

So, what is it that you are disagreeing with?

Don't tell me about Max Behr's house, talk about what influenced him regarding his philosophy on golf course architecture. TOC influenced him. He loved the place as did most of those others in California with him at that time. It was the linksland and particularly TOC and its model of even pre-golf architecture naturalism that he and they used as their natural model for GCA. It did not take William Morris, the Arts and crafts movement or Horace Hutchinson or Gertrude Jekyll and her "wild gardens" to inform him or them of that.

It was the linksland, the linksland, THE LINKSLAND, and particularly TOC, that did that. They said so themselves, all of them. Are you or Tom MacWood under some impression they didn't realize what they were saying and writing? Are you really under some misguided impression that it was their A/C houses and gardens and racetracks that did that to them with GCA.

IT WAS THE LINKSLAND!!

For Christ Sake, what did they say it for if they didn't mean it? If it was the A/C Movement which was such a powerful influence on what they said, and thought and did why didn't they at least mention it?

Tom MacWood says they didn't mention it because it hardly had a name and it was just this sort of ethereal all prevasive "philosophy" . That is the most preposterous rartionalization I've ever heard of. It's nothing more than a totally defensive and frankly pretty pathetic rationalization to maintain an unsupportable point about an all powerful influence on GCA that just was not the primary thing that influenced it. Were they trying to hide something about the A/C Movement and its powerful influence on GCA just so some quasi-golf architecture historian and fixated proponent of Morris and the English A/C movement could bring it to light about 80 years later?  

Did the A/C movement inform them of the model of TOC and the linksland? Of course not, the crap that came before them in England and America informed of that just fine.

Tom MacWood is probably going to ask once again, and ad infinitum----then why did Willie Park Jr do some rudimentary crap in England too before Sunningdale and Huntercombe? The answer is obvious--he did it because that's all he was asked to do or had the time and the money to do. Had they given him the money and the time that he had when he did Sunningdale or Huntercombe when he first came out of Scotland I'm sure he would have done what he did at Sunningdale and Huntercombe at that earlier point.

Park Jr hardly had to wait to be informed of what to do at Sunningdale and Huntercombe by Hutchinson and Country Life magazine or Morris or Gertrude Jekyll and the "arts and crafts" movement, as MacWood keeps trying to imply on here.

[TEPaul]

"I know when my friends Geoff shackelford and Gil Hanse were doing Rustic Canyon, they went over to Pasadena and took the Craftsman home tour at lleast one time. Geoff I know was over there several times. If that isn't influence in architecture well then your kidding yourself just to prove a point."

TommyN:

This is a great point. There's no question that GeoffShackelford has been powerfully influenced by the Arts and Crafts style. He mentioned that loud and clear and in some depth to me when I was out there at Rustic a number of years ago before it was built.

I think there's little question that A/C style and influence has effected a few of these architects today. I'm sure GeoffShac did influence Gil in this way and there's little question a number of these architects today are foregoing a good deal of the mechanizations available today to do massive amounts of basically hand crafted work on the features of architecture today, particularly the finished features such as bunker surrounds. If anything, this is the A/C theme.

There's no doubt in my mind the A/C theme is having some effect on the work these guys are doing today. But we're talking about the Golden Age and what influenced it, and not today. We're looking to mimic a lot of what was done in the great golden age of golf architecture but they looked to the LINKSLAND for their model and the A/C movement sure didn't need to inform them how to try to imitate some of the natural features on the linksland or how to work with their horses and hands to do it. They didn't have D-8s and D-6s and backhoes and trackhoes and Bobcats and other mechanized equipment back then anyway that they had the opportunity to forego like some of these guys today are. They had to work with their hands and their horses and pans.  

[T_MacWood]

Tom MacWood:

You should know something. I am in no way confused or ignorant about the A&C movement. I simply disagree with you about how broad its influences were generally and its powerful influence on the Golden Age of golf architecture.

There is a difference between the two and a very big one but obvously you haven't figured that out yet.

Apparently you have yet to understand that someone who has given all kinds of good and factual reasons why he disagrees with some far-fetched point you are trying to make is not necessarily confused or igonorant.

TE
Its apparent to me you are totally confused about the A&C movement and always have been. You continue to ask why there was no mention of the movement back then...the answer: like many artistic movements historians didn't give it a name until decades later.

Based on your logic since William Morris or John Ruskin never mentioned it by name I think we could conclude it really never happened and all the historians who write about its impact are all wet.

You also believe - mistakenly - that A&C philosophy and the seaside links model are mutually exclusive. That the seaside links were the primary model so there is no way the A&C movement could had any effect. Those who understand the nature of the movement understand that the A&C approach required a vernacular model....in this case the seaside links.

Tommy
Speaking of really cool houses how about Behr's house in NJ.  Very rustic...with a stream running beneath it. The gate out front features huge bolders....I've not seen anything quite like it. Geoff Shackelford has a good photo of the house...you've probably seen it.

[TEPaul]

Tom MacWood:

You know you asked a couple of really good questions in post #65 and I did my best to comprehensively answer them in post #66 (which is pretty long). Those kinds of questions and answers and discussions about them is what we should be having on here because they tend to deal with some fundamentals (influences) on golf architecture and I feel this site would feel they are of value and interest for that reason.

Most of the rest of your posts are just question responses to questions asked of you. You tend not to be very analytical when you carry on like that.

How about we try to have a discussion on the questions you asked me that I responded to?

Those 10 or 20 other questons of yours on the rest of that thread are of no value at all other than to be the reaction of a defensive man who apparently just can't engage in a  discussion on a subject very well.  

[Tommy_Naccarato]

"I know when my friends Geoff shackelford and Gil Hanse were doing Rustic Canyon, they went over to Pasadena and took the Craftsman home tour at lleast one time. Geoff I know was over there several times. If that isn't influence in architecture well then your kidding yourself just to prove a point."

TommyN:

This is a great point. There's no question that GeoffShackelford has been powerfully influenced by the Arts and Crafts style. He mentioned that loud and clear and in some depth to me when I was out there at Rustic a number of years ago before it was built.

I think there's little question that A/C style and influence has effected a few of these architects today. I'm sure GeoffShac did influence Gil in this way and there's little question a number of these architects today are foregoing a good deal of the mechanizations available today to do massive amounts of basically hand crafted work on the features of architecture today, particularly the finished features such as bunker surrounds. If anything, this is the A/C theme.

There's no doubt in my mind the A/C theme is having some effect on the work these guys are doing today. But we're talking about the Golden Age and what influenced it, and not today. We're looking to mimic a lot of what was done in the great golden age of golf architecture but they looked to the LINKSLAND for their model and the A/C movement sure didn't need to inform them how to try to imitate some of the natural features on the linksland or how to work with their horses and hands to do it. They didn't have D-8s and D-6s and backhoes and trackhoes and Bobcats and other mechanized equipment back then anyway that they had the opportunity to forego like some of these guys today are. They had to work with their hands and their horses and pans.  

Tom,
I hate to break this to you, but Max Behr was influenced by this too. Maybe not MacKenzie, but Max, you might as just well except it as fact.

FACT: Max Behr lived in Pasadena, California, widely perceived as the home of GREENE & GREENE, who more or less founded the CRAFTSMAN-style building architecture before Max even got there. I would guess if I venture to his address, I will find a home of CRAFTSMAN-style architecture.

Most of them up near Pasadena Golf Club, (Altadena) where he was a member are all of the CRAFTSMAN-style and substance. Ask Geoffrey Childs, who I got a very short tour of Pasadena during a recent visit.

FACT: His adverts reflected a keen sense of CRAFTSMAN style and substance, from the ivy-like wing-dings to the bric-a-brac borders. all describing PERMANENT GOLF ARCHITECTURE.

Tom, I think if you actually saw some of Max's courses, with a little bit of knowledge of what the Southern California landscape was all about, you might change your tune drastically. If you didn't, then I would swear it was just to disagree with Tom MacWood. (It's been pretty fashionable as of late to do just that, and I do think Tom brings-up a lot of valid points that some just don't care to visit/aren't capable of visiting.)

I'll try to describe what I think a Max Behr course looked like. You can call and ask Geoff Shac if I'm wrong or right or just try to form your own opinion without listening to reason or observing facts. Facts that you simply don't know, only what you perceive to know, or at the very least, facts which you just seemingly want to disagree with Tom MacWood about. (This fact, your not just wrong. Your just not knowledgable on the subject other then what you've accurately read from Behr.)

The courses weren't much to look at first glance. They almost looked like an empty field until you started having to hit shots to the target--the green, a huge/wide fairway where placement of the tee shot evoked several different types of play. You were never out of it on a Max course, even if you were in a fairway bunker.

Every aspect of the courses looked natural from some point in the fairway, until actually getting up close to them and seeing how they were actually constructed. Many of them had been created, like rolls and dramatic tie-ins which Max had no problem in wielding his hand. Oakmont CC #3 is one for example, where this raised, little reverse-Redan of a fairway that started about 20 yards in front of the green could kick a ball into the back tee, averting a carry over a rather large deep and fronting bunker. There was nothing natural about it, but from the fairway that features a rather large dip which tied into this man-made shape perfectly, if not succinctly for the type of challenge presented from every spot on the golf hole. It was like every aspect of the hole was multi-dimensional, as if he spent hours upon hours on how and where to create challenge or simply found it. Much like a Craftsman finds a way to tie-in a wooden butt joint while hiding the screws or nails which bond it together.

Now here's the kicker:

The original fauna--all natural oaks and scrub which on every course has now all been diluted heavy with pine trees that would never exist on a site like this, green, green grass that looks totally out of place for a site so natural, as well as crushed whit e marble for sand in the bunkers which looks as if the particular club found itself a $10.00 hooker as a date to the Member/Guest dinner, all on the--the high ground of a river bed. (I'm thinking of three Max courses in particular whe describing this--each one private and each one completely out of touch what their golf course was ever about.)

The bunkers, well Max's constructed bunkers weren't much to look at--at least they didn't have the natural lacy look in the Billy Bell/MacKenzie sense, but they were--get this--placed naturally in areas where a slope would show wear and erosion. It was all a part of his "look." Theedges were rough but not lacy, and they did have a cape or bay here or there, wherever a severe slope or ridge dictated it to make it look as if water went in directions of top to bottom/the point of least resistance. Some of them would tie-in or hide the target, but there was plenty of options to stay way from them with minimal penalty, only creating an even more interesting sho tinto them. A true sportsman's challenge if there ever was one.

If a natural waste area was part of the landscape, it was used somehow, someway ingeniously, making you feel like you were on a links course, yet never letting go of the fact what kind of environment you were located in.

(Greene & Greene did the same when they used Japanese-influenced styles in their architecture, just the same way Max utilized Scottish influenced styles in his, along with their zest for the natural styles of Craftsman architecture in his quests.)

Greens: Most of Max's greens featured some really interesting pin placements and there never seems to be any two greens shaped alike. If there were on any of his course, then it was only because he was presenting a different type of shot to handle them.

But most of all--through all of this, HE HAD NO PROBLEM MOVING EARTH. (when he needed to)

Now the thing I think where I can really try to influence you IF your willing to understand in the same way I have learned from you like places like Pine Valley and Maidstone and NGLA and oh-so-many-others, is that the method of construction--the very root of ARTS & CRAFTS ARCHITECTURE was practiced by Max to no end, when he constructed his courses. That's the point of being a CRAFTSMAN. You work every angle you can professionally, by making sure pride is taken when building it--that's where the TRUE ARTISTRY comes from. Where Greene & Greene would practice different styles of butt joints and methods of craftsmanship, Max would do the very same in how he moved much land to create the movement at Lakeside and Oakmont and Rancho Santa Fe. At Lakeside he imported loamy soils from Long Beach and transported them to Toluca Lake, even though he was afforded the find of pockets of beach sand on the property.

TOM, HE ACTUALLY WENT DOWN TO WHERE THE SAME SANDS ON-SITE, WOULD CARRY TO NEAR THE END OF THE L.A. RIVER AND TRANSPORT THEM BACK TO THE LANDS FROM WHICH THEY ONCE CAME FROM, VIA THE L.A. RIVER BED.

Is that CRAFTSMAN-STYLE of construction enough for you?

Tom, your my dear friend. Come out to LaLaLand when the winter cold hits. You have a lot to learn out here. Just as I still have a lot to learn back there and here too.

[Doug Bolls]

To both Toms - I am a recent newbie to this site and am trying to learn all I can.  I would give you both great marks for your contributions to the dialog - I could sense both your frustration and respect for each other's views.  You took me some places I have never been - googleing "Capability Brown" and the Victorian website.
You made me realize how little I know about GCA - and how much I have to learn - so, please continue.  I am on the outside looking in - it is a very interteresting view.
DB

[T_MacWood]

Tom MacWood:

You know you asked a couple of really good questions in post #65 and I did my best to comprehensively answer them in post #66 (which is pretty long). Those kinds of questions and answers and discussions about them is what we should be having on here because they tend to deal with some fundamentals (influences) on golf architecture and I feel this site would feel they are of value and interest for that reason.

Most of the rest of your posts are just question responses to questions asked of you. You tend not to be very analytical when you carry on like that.

How about we try to have a discussion on the questions you asked me that I responded to?

Those 10 or 20 other questons of yours on the rest of that thread are of no value at all other than to be the reaction of a defensive man who apparently just can't engage in a  discussion on a subject very well.  

TE
I think it was post #49 and I'm not surprised you declined to answer those other ten questions. It pretty much confirms what I've known all along about your knowledge of that period.

I think golf architecture is without question an art form. Any creative endeavor that requires imagination, skill and craftsmanship is an art. And the architects of that era believed that as well...MacKenzie, Behr, Macdonald and Simpson wrote about it. And golf architects are not immune to cultural influences and popular aesthtic tastes...they are effected. Throughout the history of golf architecture you can observe the effect.