[Patrick_Mucci]

Brad Klein,

I think you have to examine the evolutionary process of golf in order to address your question.

Golf started on links or links like sites void of trees and flora associated with gardens.

Early golf courses were clearly, BARREN fields of play, not remotely associated with garden like settings or formal gardens.

But, as golf and golf courses moved inland, perhaps to offset the absence of water or to compensate for the views of the industrialized world, landscaping the site/course took hold.

Unfortunately, in some cases, it not only took hold, it ran amuck.

Imagine playing Sand Hills or Wild Horse a dozen or so years after a beautification/arbor committee was formed.

Think how it would detract from the experience and from playing the golf course.

Conversely, urban, industrialized or sites surrounded by residential units could probably benefit from a measure of landscaping.

One of the things that dismayed me about Lehigh was the excessive plantings and focus on sprucing up every static site.   Tees, greens and every location where carts would stop or park was inundated with flowers, shrubs and trees, all the work of out of control committees.

In addition, these items must be replenished and maintained, causing the capital and operating budget to take a hit AND diverting the focus from the golf course, the playing field, which is the primal lure.

I don't feel that a golf course is a garden and continue to battle against those that are trying to convert fields of play to formal or informal gardens.

[Steve Burrows]

If we are talking about evolutionary processes, then we can't ignore the fact that a golf "green" does not refer to the color green, but borrows instead from the traditional British word green, as in a village green, or in other words, a garden.  This also accounts for discussions on this site about whether the superintendents should be called greenkeepers or green(s)keepers.  Indeed, the word refers to one who is a keeper of the green, or a keeper of the garden.

I think there is often too strict of an interpretation of the words being used in these discussions (and perhaps others), and we maybe need to think about the origins and derivations of the words and concepts, rather than just focusing on the modern definition and understanding.

[Peter Zarlengo]

As far as the connection between landscape architecture and golf course design goes I have battled back and forth between the proper relationship between the two.

If you buy into the theory that landscape architects are "placemakers", and also that creating place requires marrying the componants of site and program, then golf course design is landscape architecture. The program for golf is a round of golf. The site is the land on which the course will sit.

Is golf course design garden design? Absolutely not. The function of a golf course and a garden are drastically different. But the way we maintainin and view golf courses is sometimes not all that different from gardens.

[Adam_F_Collins]

Brad,

I wrote a paper during my graduate studies which suggested that the golf course is the most important garden of the modern era. The rise of the public park was an effort to provide the common man, working in a growing industrial age, with a 'natural' place to spend his recreational time. But the wealthy man never did spend his free time amongst the common throng...

..he built golf courses for himself and his peers. It's the more 'civilized' version of a walk in the park.

Gardens have long been used as markers of social rank. Read the articles by Chandra Mukerji (?) To me, the development and proliferation of the golf course is an extension of this.

The case is not a hard one to make, and it surprises me how many oppose it.

Have fun.

[Adam_F_Collins]

I posted the topic here about a year ago.

Something like: "The Golf Course as the Most Important Garden of the Modern Era" - the topic didn't go far - everyone got hung up on the meaning of the word 'important'...

On the other hand, my professor, an expert on the history of the pleasure garden, was very excited about the topic and suggested that I undertake a book on the subject. The fact that the two realms don't mix much in terms of historical research and discussion is surprising.

[TEPaul]

"The fact that the two realms don't mix much in terms of historical research and discussion is surprising."

Adam:

Perhaps it is surprising, or maybe it just seems so to you as you are young. There are many aspects in the history and evolution of golf course architecture and garden and LA design and maybe it's just that the time has finally come when the mixture of those two realms will begin to be historically researched.

Go for it.

[TEPaul]

"Is golf course design garden design? Absolutely not. The function of a golf course and a garden are drastically different. But the way we maintainin and view golf courses is sometimes not all that different from gardens."
Peter Zarlengo

A remarkably trenchant remark, in my opinion.

[TEPaul]

"I think there is often too strict of an interpretation of the words being used in these discussions (and perhaps others), and we maybe need to think about the origins and derivations of the words and concepts, rather than just focusing on the modern definition and understanding."
Steve Burrows


Another remarkably trenchant remark, in my opinion!

[Adam_F_Collins]

In my study of the subject (which is limited to be sure), I found that one of the strongest connections between the two realms was the continuing discussion of the importance of "nature".

The garden is often defined as a place built for the purpose of the enjoyment of nature, yet in none of those places is nature allowed to exist 'naturally'.

The importance of nature, its forms and cycles is also continually discussed within the realm of the golf course. Both realms constantly debate how much 'nature' belongs - how to hide or reveal the control we exercise over the landscape; the earth and growing things within it. How will our efforts be preserved or erased by time and nature itself?

The two can also be discussed in anthropological and sociological frameworks, which is also very interesting. Why would a person spend 5 million dollars on a single par three? What are the socio-political ramifications of an ultra-exclusive golf club like Augusta? What are the social/political/economical ramifications of holding a National Championship at one's home course?

It can be interesting to discuss 'nature' when we're actually seen as a part of it. What is the human animal doing in these arrangements of natural elements? Why all of the effort toward building and maintaining them? Many would reduce the answers to simply, growing plants, or chasing a little white ball around. The promenade at the great gardens of Versialles was often written off as simply very rich people walking around with nothing better to do.

That's why articles like the ones from Mukerji get me to thinking - there's more to all of this. The golf course is a very important pleasure garden.

[TEPaul]

Adam:

Good post.

All of this and the mixture of it certainly has a good deal more to it than just very rich people walking around in these designed and constructed atmospheres (gardens and golf courses) because they have nothing better to do.

If you haven't already, you've got to read Simon Schama's "Landscape and Memory"---it's something else.

Man has been, is, and probably always will be inextricably connected to Nature in all kinds of interesting ways---shallow, deep, domineering, appreciating, you name it---it seems to go on and on and probably always will be the eternally fascinating dynamic.

There probably never will be any pat answer--it's probably just all about what's individual and personal, just like golf is.

[Adam_F_Collins]

...There probably never will be an answer--it's probably just individual and personal, just like golf is.

True enough, Tom. And like golf, it's not the destination that's important (because in the end, you're back at the beginning), but what happens along the way.

Such discussions are for the purpose of discussing. History is always changing, I guess that is what makes these discussions 'important' - or to have that potential. But for those of us talking, it's about the search; the thinking and musing and exchanging. Any 'answers' just end that particular game...

...then you go looking for another one.

[Peter Pallotta]

Off Adam's remarks about the social/political aspects, it is interesting to think about the U.S. after WW2, and its seemingly conscious rejection of all things "European," i.e communism and fascism and existentialism and Freud etc. And with it, the dramatic change in style of American golf courses, away from the natural, free/strategic roots in the UK and towards a much more directly penal style of gca that celebrated the anti-natural technology (e.g. earth moving machines) required to build it. It was as if "natural" was suddenly seen as decadent. Was the garden ever further away from the golf course than in the 1950s and 60s?

Peter      

[TEPaul]

"History is always changing,"

Adam:

It's a whole other subject, of course, but I don't think so. To me history ("History) isn't changing exactly, it's just increasing. History from my perspective is a search for the accuracy of facts. Once we've done the best we possibly can in that vein, then we can discuss and play all kinds of "what if" games that can help us better understand the whys and wherefors of the goings-on now or help us into the future.

[Adam_F_Collins]

... It was as if "natural" was suddenly seen as decadent. Was the garden ever further away from the golf course than in the 1950s and 60s?
   

Peter,

Interesting thoughts.

As to this last question, It depends on what kind of garden you're talking about. Some gardens strive for a more 'natural appearance in their philosophies, yet vary enormously in their products. For instance, the Chinese Scholar's garden and the English Landscape Park. On the other hand, there are highly abstract arrangements which result in things as varied as the French formal garden and the Japanese Zen garden.

As you point out, it would be interesting to investigate the period following WWII and look at both the work of GCA's as well as anything written on the subject during that period, and see what kinds of philosophical threads we find.

[Adam_F_Collins]

"History is always changing,"

Adam:

It's a whole other subject...

Sure Tom, it's increasing - until something like the destruction of the library at Alexandria. Then it's decreased, and is rebuilt from the pieces. Each 'reconstruction' carries some creation on the part of the historian. Look at the discussions we've had here regarding The Arts and Crafts.

Some people read the ravings here as 'right'. They add a bit as they re-tell someone on the golf course, etc. etc. etc. Just look at some old history books. Look at the way natives are portrayed, women, religion, etc. "Historical" movies have americans doing things in past wars that the British actually did. Where does history exist? It's shared, and that sharing alters it. And all the while, we're getting further and further from the actual events which are the subject of our debate.

But as you say, it's another subject. One day we'll meet, Tom Paul. Then we'll have a lot to talk about. Maybe we'll even play some golf.

[TEPaul]

"Off Adam's remarks about the social/political aspects, it is interesting to think about the U.S. after WW2, and its seemingly conscious rejection of all things "European," i.e communism and fascism and existentialism and Freud etc. And with it, the dramatic change in style of American golf courses, away from the natural, free/strategic roots in the UK and towards a much more directly penal style of gca that celebrated the anti-natural technology (e.g. earth moving machines) required to build it. It was as if "natural" was suddenly seen as decadent. Was the garden ever further away from the golf course than in the 1950s and 60s?"


Peter:

Some pretty good notions there.

However, I think what you say happened in America after WW2 probably happened a lot earlier---like just after WW1 or perhaps up to 20 or more years before that.

And I'm not so sure I'd say that we (Americans) looked at "natural" as decadent---probably more like something that was (or could be) a quaint idea of times and places past for us.

One cannot forget that "Americans", their ethos and outlook on so many things just may be the most arrogant and self-possessed in the history of modern man. One of our interesting and undeniably redeeming characteristics, however, (if one ever can be general about these kinds of things) is our capacity to actually feel quite guilty about many of the things we do or even think.

     

[Peter Pallotta]

As you point out, it would be interesting to investigate the period following WWII and look at both the work of GCA's as well as anything written on the subject during that period, and see what kinds of philosophical threads we find.

My guess, Adam, is that you won't find in the writings of RTJ an explicitly-stated philosophy that relates his gca to anything sociological/political, and certainly not along the lines I describe of a whole-scale rejection of European "isms". If something like that was in fact happening, I'd imagine it was happeing largely unconsiously, at least in RTJ's case -- and whether that makes him a leader or a follower I don't know. But even there, it's interesting to contrast his lack of a broad philosophy with the consciously philosophical questions that Max Behr sometimes asked 30 years earlier (in the "jazz age," perhaps not coincidentally).

But just guess work on my part; a developing "theory".

Peter    

TE - just saw your post. Thanks. I think many of us would be interested in getting more from you on what was happening to gca that early on, i.e. just after WWI or even before that. And, I hope you didn't get any sense of "American-bashing" from me/my post. Some of my very favourite people are Americans, and as I use the term, America is a state of mind.  

[Adam Sherer]

If "A = B"

Then "B = A"

Right?

Simple converse theory.


So, if "a golf course is a garden" (A = B)

then, wouldn't the converse be true?

A "garden is a golf course"?  (B = A)



I know this is a simplistic rationalization of the question, but shouldn't we look at the question the other way as well?

Is a garden a golf course?

[TEPaul]

(PeterP)

"As you point out, it would be interesting to investigate the period following WWII and look at both the work of GCA's as well as anything written on the subject during that period, and see what kinds of philosophical threads we find."

Adam:

That would be interesting. What do you think? Nothing much comes to my mind at the moment. It may've just been that we (the Americans) were the most conveniently placed at that time to jump into a virtual void left after a 20 year hiatus. And of course we had one of the best salesmen and self promoters in the history of golf course architecture just waiting in the wings to take center stage which he surely did do.

[TEPaul]

"TE - just saw your post. Thanks. I think many of us would be interested in getting more from you on what was happening to gca that early on, i.e. just after WWI or even before that. And, I hope you didn't get any sense of "American-bashing" from me/my post. Some of my very favourite people are Americans, and as I use the term, America is a state of mind. "

Peter:

Not at all.

What I meant by what may've been happening earlier with America and Americans in both golf and GCA can probably be found in some of C.B. Macdonald's musing found in his own book published in 1928.

Particularly the part he related about the speech of the incoming USGA president (R.H. Robertson) in, I think 1901;

From "Scotland's Gift Golf":

"But now comes the "rift in the lute." "I know," he said, "that we are all grateful for what England and Scotland have done for us in the exporting of this game for our delectation and amusement; but I think we should guard against being too restricted and held down by precedent and tradition. I fear that it is the fault of the game on the other side. Do not let us be afraid of innovations simply because they are innovations. Nothing can come to America and stay very long without being Americanized in character; and I hope this game will be no exception to this rule. I should like to see American golf."

[TEPaul]

"If "A = B"

Then "B = A"

Right?

Simple converse theory.


So, if "a golf course is a garden" (A = B)

then, wouldn't the converse be true?

A "garden is a golf course"?  (B = A)



I know this is a simplistic rationalization of the question, but shouldn't we look at the question the other way as well?

Is a garden a golf course? "


But the question remains---Is a golf course a garden? You only mention one possibilty (if)---eg yes it is.  

If for whatever reason it isn't then I guess it follows that a garden probably isn't a golf course.  

[Brad Klein]

Lots of very interesting material here. Thanks for the speculating. Love the idea of the "green" as public space. That always reminds me of St. Andrews, and of Frederick Law Olmsted's moralizing about parkland and park space. I also like the fact that the contributions are roughly split 50/50 on the issue -- even the gardeners are not in agreement. All of which tells me that there's far more theoretical and aesthetic substance to Landscape Architecture historically than is widely practised or understood by most such architects today.
Or, to answer Jeff Brauer, part of the point of bringing LA back in to make sure it's not lousy LA that's being undertaken.

As for Pat Mucci's point about taking  an evolutionary point of view, that's precisely the entire point of the exercise. And rather than seeing links courses as the sole or dominant focal point for understanding what a golf course is, I think the whole problematic of GCA is to determine what to do on non-links sites. In other words, the craft emerges in the transition from linksland to land and settings that have to be contrived for the purpose. That's why I prefer to think about GCA as "contrived naturalism." For that purpose, some garden styles are better and worse than others. It doesn't entail an arboretum, or a formal Japanese garden. There are all sorts of 'floral hazards' that are part of the outcome. I think the whole question is what sort of a garden are we talking about -- "the right plant in the right spot."

[TEPaul]

Brad Klein said:

"And rather than seeing links courses as the sole or dominant focal point for understanding what a golf course is, I think the whole problematic of GCA is to determine what to do on non-links sites. In other words, the craft emerges in the transition from linksland to land and settings that have to be contrived for the purpose. That's why I prefer to think about GCA as "contrived naturalism." For that purpose, some garden styles are better and worse than others. It doesn't entail an arboretum, or a formal Japanese garden. There are all sorts of 'floral hazards' that are part of the outcome. I think the whole question is what sort of a garden are we talking about -- "the right plant in the right spot.""


Brad:

That surely is the point and the question which is made most interesting historically by the use for golf courses towards the end of the 19th century and on of some of the massive landscape "park" estate layouts of the likes of Lancelot "Capability" Brown.

The thing to take note of, in my opinion, is that Brown lived and worked up to a century or more before golf first emigrated out of the Scottish linksland to inland sites elsewhere but first mostly to inland England (where most all of Brown's "parkland" designs were)----not to mention the fact that Brown lived and worked up to a century before the art form of dedicated man-constructed golf course architecture even began in the Scottish linksland.

What is so interesting to me historically is obviously an early LA like Brown had no thought whatsoever that the structure of the designs he made so famous (he was basically the originator or popularizer of so-called "English Landscape Architecture") would not only be used perhaps a century later to route golf courses through but that GCA would in fact take the essence of his LA style and structure with its curvilinear lines (Serpintine) and essentially make that its own in the future not just in a routing sense but also in the sense of future architectural feature shapes.

Basically it seems to have been a chronology of hiatus, then happenstance and then the assumption and application of an aesthetic of a quite different art form (LA vs GCA).

It probably happened initially as it did for the simple reason that the LA designs of the likes of Capability Brown were of a size and structure that one could easily and conveniently fit a field of play the size of a golf course into.

[Jerry Kluger]

Allow me to ask some questions concerning these gardens:

Were they not done at a time where social and economic class was of utmost importance, and were they not done to impress those who visited as opposed to enjoyment of the owners?  If so, are they not more closely related to some of the more, shall we say, ornate courses being built today?

[TEPaul]

"If so, are they not more closely related to some of the more, shall we say, ornate courses being built today?"

JerryK:

Probably not. It may be pretty safe to say that the inherent taste of the 18th century's Lord Burlington compared to the inherent taste of the 21st century's Donald Trump is, frankly, how shall we say, world's apart aesthetically and in every other way?

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