Transitioning out of the Victorian Era - How does it best happen?

[John Connolly]

While there is great historical intrigue for those courses first laid out around the turn of the 19th century which sported geometric design features of cop bunkers, square greens etc., wouldn't it have been difficult to transition to classic design when those clubs renovated during the golden age? I suppose there were inherent limitations on the new design based on what was already in place. I realize that it would have depended on the club, case by case, but certainly the bias of the first Victorian design would have to be overcome in some fashion. One wonders if it wasn't analogous to a house remodel. Maybe sometimes it's just better to tear it down and rebuild.

[Jon Wiggett]

While there is great historical intrigue for those courses first laid out around the turn of the 19th century which sported geometric design features of cop bunkers, square greens etc., wouldn't it have been difficult to transition to classic design when those clubs renovated during the golden age? I suppose there were inherent limitations on the new design based on what was already in place. I realize that it would have depended on the club, case by case, but certainly the bias of the first Victorian design would have to be overcome in some fashion. One wonders if it wasn't analogous to a house remodel. Maybe sometimes it's just better to tear it down and rebuild.

[Jeff_Brauer]

John,

Probably too big a topic for most to grasp here.  Not sure I do!

That said, I have always thought that we tend to look back and mentally compress an era.  The Golden Age was almost 20 years, not some one time event.  Maybe more. I have always counted Murfield (1892 version) as the first modern looking course (to my eye) extending it to 40 years, even if a few early US practitioners didn't try to emulate it.

The Victorian Age may have lasted 200 or so!  And, as noted above, we may also try to simplify and symbolize the period with a few well known examples, but even if the first enlightened Golden Age archie did some swerves vs. straight lines, a dozen others we don't know, because they were unremarkable, kept on doing what they were doing, more interested in the check than in setting precedence.

As to your tear down and rebuild statement, that happened a lot, too.  Merion moved from its first location, so did Northland in Duluth and many, many others, from their "golf course starter kits" and original locations.

Lastly, when did they know their Golden Age designs were "classics?"  Or were those labeled much later?

[Ian Mackenzie]

While there is great historical intrigue for those courses first laid out around the turn of the 19th century which sported geometric design features of cop bunkers, square greens etc., wouldn't it have been difficult to transition to classic design when those clubs renovated during the golden age? I suppose there were inherent limitations on the new design based on what was already in place. I realize that it would have depended on the club, case by case, but certainly the bias of the first Victorian design would have to be overcome in some fashion. One wonders if it wasn't analogous to a house remodel. Maybe sometimes it's just better to tear it down and rebuild.

I get what John is saying.
Many courses were first designed (in the US) between 1895 and 1905 but a large percentage of them (sorry for the subjectivity here) were then redone/redesigned/rebuilt/renovated by the Golden Era crew between 1910 and 1930 as penal golf gave way to more strategic design.


No thread-hijack intended here, but what motivated this...?...:new technology in equipment and construction? Simple design progression? Arrival of new blood? An awakening of an American awareness for design?

[Sven Nilsen]

Two basic reasons for the transitions:


1.  Course distances became outdated.  Due to changes in the ball (and the clubs) there was a major shift in the distances at which courses were built between the late 1890's and 1910.  Even NGLA was considered a bit short when compared to some of its contemporaries.  When 5,000 yards was once suitable, courses now were pushing over 6,500 yards.  In today's equivalence, that would be like jumping from a standard of 7,000 to around 8,700.


2.  A change in style.  You can cite CBM as the primary driver of a move to a more natural style of design, but it started well before NGLA with Travis being a primary driver.  As more people became more familiar with the courses in the UK, what had worked before to get the game off of the ground in this country was seen as inappropriate.  Throw in a willingness to spend more money on construction (as opposed to laying out a course and creating basic hazards), and you have projects that would have seemed unwieldy a few years prior.


To answer the initial question as to how it best happens, I would think it would depend on each individual course.  There may have been sites where a shift away from the Victorian style was an easy proposition, where the more natural features were already present.  On the other hand.  This may have often meant there was no need to alter the routing, as the bones for a more natural course were sitting there waiting to be utilized.  On the other hand, there were many sites where the club was better off just blowing up the course and starting anew.  It would be a lengthy study to determined which path was taken more, but if I had to guess I'd say the blow it up route was the more common result.


Sad to say, but many Golden Age designs suffered the same fate as their Victorian counterparts, all for the sake of modernization.

[Thomas Dai]

The Victorian Age may have lasted 200 or so!

Jeff,
I appreciate the use of '!' but I'm a bit confused as Queen Victoria's reign commenced in 1837 and ceased when she died in 1901.
Atb

[Sean_A]

I think the bottom line of how architecture transitioned out of the Victorian Age was the provision of a sketchy map by some VA archies which was then recognized as such and redrafted into a proper road map by the great British archies.  The Oxbridge guys changed everything from creating a philosophy of design - including aesthetics - to figuring out the best soil and turf for golf to a willingness to bend the landscape to their wishes. The best few American archies copied the concepts and voila....we have classic courses. 


As Jeff suggests, I think the Golden Age lasted far longer than from 1900-1920.  To me it starts with the expansion of TOC into what can recognize today all the way to a least WWII.  Thats something like 75ish years.  As with most things, there was considerable overlap of competing ideas, just like today.



Ciao 

[Tommy Naccarato]

John, Arbs has got it right with Jeff Brauer getting it wrong. 


The Victorian Era was the end of the monarchy and a movement into a new creativity in art and architecture; in free thinking outside of the box.  It was coloring outside of the lines in some respect to those old sedated values that had become stale and obsolete.  t


The Golden Age of Architecture definitely started in the 1900's and continued through the 20's and into the 30's, hampered, by the effects of world wide financial depression--to its final courses like Bethpage and Santa Anita being built as a methods of keeping people employed.  At the time, architects like Behr and Tiilinghast abhorred the New Deal, but in all actuality, it gave us an ending to the Golden Age that might not have happened if it wasn't for that effort to keep people employed.  What killed it for good was something called World War.


Ironically, look at the tee sheet of those two examples (Bethpage and Santa Anita and any other WPA project) and those places are packed all of the time!


In all of this, I do think that we are in a minor Golden Age of sorts with the work of Tom Doak, Bill Coore, DeVries, Nuzzo et. al that have consciously strived to be influenced by Golden Age ideals.


Hallelujah!

[John Connolly]

Sven, your response about how it happened aligns with what one would instinctively assume - that it depended on the circumstances. I suppose the transition could have varied from slow and barely perceptible to abrupt and with wholesale changes. In that latter setting, seems there would have been a better chance at embracing, and effectively locking in, those ideals held so tightly here.

One of the bigger breakthroughs in American design must have been that even though links land wasn't in abundance, designing holes harmoniously with what was underfoot was still an important ingredient for great design. It seems to be one of the few goals of architects even to this day.

My guess is that when an ODG walked onto a course in 1916 for a renovation of a course that was laid out in an afternoon 20 years earlier, he might have exclaimed, "Why didn't you call me then?"

[Peter Pallotta]

John - I think that at the level of theory and cause as oppossed to that of practical considerations and effects, Sean has hit upon the crucial element, ie

young, supremely confident Oxford-educated men of privilege eager to usher in the sea-changes of the Edwardian Age and by temperament predisposed to anchoring and promoting in almost philosophic terms their emerging (and soon to be dominant) views on aesthetics, culture, religion, nature, politics, sports, and social relations.

When men like these turned their attention and connections and resources to golf and its fields of play, the existing work of  those earnest, sensible Victorian working men didn't stand a chance...

[Matt Dawson]

young, supremely confident Oxford-educated men

No Peter - Sean said "Oxbridge "

Very. Important. Distinction. Pace Mr H. S Colt and the rest of the Captain's board at Royal Worlington

[Niall C]

From a UK perspective I really don't think it is nearly as cut and dried as suggested. For one thing courses were constantly evolving, being tweaked/redesigned on a regular basis, for good or for bad. That included different design influences and mindsets such that you simply didn't flick a switch and suddenly all new design was strategic or natural.

Even the revered Golden Age guys didn't hit the ground at full sprint. What they did do though, through a period of time was articulate and publish those ideas very well and that is what modern day architects at least pay lip service to today. Whether the ideas actually originated with those guys is another matter. Just because they wrote the book..........

Niall

[Jim_Kennedy]

So is it as simple as 'revive to survive' or 'replace to keep pace'?

[Niall C]

Jim


I don't know that I'd express it quite like that. I don't think there was competition. If anything the opposite with collaboration and sharing of new ideas. Maybe a more apt way of putting it might be to say that folks were keen to try out new fashions.


Niall

[Keith Cutten]

Gentlemen,


My article, recently published in the latest issue of Golf Course Architecture Magazine, explores this very topic.  I believe my research reveals new answers surrounding many of these such debates, which have defined this forum since 2005 when Thomas MacWood released his excellent five-part paper - Arts and Crafts Golf.  I hope you enjoy.


http://digital.tudor-rose.co.uk/golf-course-architecture/issue46/#42

[Adam Lawrence]

young, supremely confident Oxford-educated men

No Peter - Sean said "Oxbridge "

Very. Important. Distinction. Pace Mr H. S Colt and the rest of the Captain's board at Royal Worlington

yes, very sadly we have to accept that the Tabs played a major role here...

[Ben Malach]

Having read Keith's article. Its interesting as it shows the natural flow of evolution rather than the stark lines demarcating eras that is easy to do. But it leaves me wondering what golf world would be like without the arts and craft movement.