Pat; Sorry but for once you miss the point. If the land was alterd prior to the architects arrival, then that canvas is what they have to work with. The logical consequence of your post is that Tom and Bill/Ben, in order to build a natural/minimalist site on the course, were required to undo the strip mining by bulldozing it flat like the surrounding terrain and then start over. Surely you cannot be suggesting that. The architect is given the site. He decides the best way to work with what he is given. How much earth is moved and how it is shaped is part of what defines the architecture. It is, to my way of thinking, not the most important factor in evaluating the work. Routing, challenge, shot variety, aesthetics etc all come together in a package that helps one decide his opinion of the work. But if one is blessed with a site that has greater features than the surrounding property, it is entirely natural and appropriate to take advantage of those features. If the architect had manufactured them on flat ground and they had come out as well, it would probably have been more costly but I would have congratulated him nonetheless. But it takes a diferent kind of artistic vision to "find" the routing and the holes on a landscape and to augment them in a manner that creates intersting courses such as these. Again, it is a matter of taste as to whether the process matters to you. But the work stands on its own. To answer your original question, if Rees had built the hole I would have applauded. However as I suggested previously, it would have been out of character for the work I have seen.