Was Dr Mackenzie the same architect in the US as he was in GB&I?

[Marty Bonnar]

Is it possible Ally MacK had a Robert Johnson moment? Maybe he also went down to a crossroads and sold his soul to the devil. Whatever happened, it's clear he had some kind of epiphany, moving his style choices along from the practical and simplistic(?) to joyous exploration of golfing landscape detailing of the finest kind.
We should all be glad he did...


F.


PS Obviously, Pitreavie was that moment...

[Duncan Cheslett]

A middle-aged man is in a dull childless marriage and something of a career rut with his most notable work twenty years behind him. The war and its aftermath have robbed him of potentially his most productive years and the kind of income which he feels he is worth. The kind of income he turned his back on when he gave up medical practice.


The opportunity comes to sail to America where he is feted as a celebrity and he quickly wins the kind of prestige commissions which have always eluded him at home.


This is followed up by an extended trip to the Antipodes where every golf club in the region flocks to sit at his feet and listen to his words of wisdom.


Around the same time his child-hood sweetheart is widowed and a reunion is effected.


The middle-aged man goes a little bit mad - but in a good way.




Classic stuff...


 

[Ally Mcintosh]

Taking aside budgets, style, bunkering and scale, what courses appear to be his best use of land in the U.K. - his best routings?


I hear Cavendish a lot.


What about mundane MacK courses where the routing also appears mundane?

[Sean_A]

Cavendish is well routed as it uses the available features (railway embankment, wall, ravine/stream) very well, covers a hilly site without a single slog walk (the 3s do most of theheavy lifting), retains a wood in the centre of the property and manages to create a course suitable for aerial play to suit the wet conditions of the area by in the main using excellent green sites rather than by bunkering. 


Alwoodley is less obviously well routed, but it did take a stroke of genius to come up with the crossing 3s to cope with the narrow bit of the property.  But you also get holes like the 8th with the green angled against the slope of the fairway. 


Ciao

[Tom_Doak]

Taking aside budgets, style, bunkering and scale, what courses appear to be his best use of land in the U.K. - his best routings?

Ally:


You should go and see Halifax.  It's a difficult site, and the shaping work was not that special, but the routing makes the most of the dramatic opportunities there.

[Thomas Dai]

The last three courses credited to Dr MacK' in the southern part of GB - ie The Worcestershire (Malvern), Worcester GC and the re-do at Walsall have some differences, for example in the bunkering as per these photos acquired from a bit of web-searching -

The Worcestershire GC (Malvern) - below - built on the site of a former farm - 3 visits by Alister per the Timeline - completed in May 1927 - with original bunkering such as this -



Worcester GC - below - built in the grounds of a former country mansion (Boughton Park) - 2 visits by Alister per the Timeline - completed in May 1928 with original bunkering seemingly more formal - the 18th green in the bottom left corner of the photo montage below is not dissimilar to pictures I've seen of some of his California bunkering. Indeed the greenside mounding is not dissimilar to the mounding I've seen in photos of the Jockey Club and even ANGC.


Walsall - re-do completed 1932 - no photos to hand but my recollection is that the bunkering at Walsall is very much of the bays and capes variety (bit like photos I've seen of his Aussie bunkering).


Different budget levels maybe?

Not sure where this gets us but the photos are nice to see!


atb

[Niall C]

From reports I've seen he wasn't slow in putting forward his brothers company and suggesting that his fees be rolled into the construction contract thereby giving him the same level of control you refer to in the US. That's what he did at Hazlehead with unhappy results. I don't think you'd confuse the styling at Hazlehead with Cypress Point so not sure level of control explains that.

I don't think anyone would confuse Charles MacKenzie with Perry Maxwell or Robert Hunter!


Also, from my reading, Alister and Charles were estranged after his divorce [because their wives got along], so whatever was built in the UK in MacKenzie's name after 1926 should have an asterisk after it.

Tom

I'm pretty sure you wouldn't mistake a Yorkshireman for a couple of Americans but was the set up not the same, in that Dr Mac had an on going involvement beyond the initial plans ? If that is the case were the stylistic differences his late UK work and his US work in terms of shaping, bunker design etc more to do with his associates than any changes to MacKenzies own design ideas ?

It seems to me that his willingness/ability to make the most of what ever natural features the site had remained with him throughout his career.

Niall 

[BCrosby]

Thomas -


Your pictures are striking. They show features not unlike those i recall seeing in pictures of the Portland course at Troon at the time it opened. The original iterations of at least some of MacK's UK courses don't seem terribly different from his work in the US.   


As I speculated above, I wonder if the modern differences are due (at least in part) to different maintenance regimes in the UK vs. US over the last 90 or so years.


Bob

[Adam Lawrence]

Taking aside budgets, style, bunkering and scale, what courses appear to be his best use of land in the U.K. - his best routings?

Ally:


You should go and see Halifax.  It's a difficult site, and the shaping work was not that special, but the routing makes the most of the dramatic opportunities there.

Love that course. Must go back sometime, I haven't been there since I was a kid. That said the course was originally by Braid and was only altered by Dr Mac. I don't know to what extent he can be credited with the routing.

[Thomas Dai]

Bob,
Thanks.
Here's the 6th at Troon Portland from 1923 from this thread -http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,35479.0.html



Looks a bit 'scruffier' than the photos of Worcester and The Worcestershire I posted above. But then again the Portland photo was taken a few years earlier and the terrain is coastal rather than inland. But then again the bunkering in this 1927 photo (below) of The Worcestershire doesn't exactly show manicured bunkering!

Maintenance regimes, timing, budgets and all that.
atb

[Sean_A]

Bob,
Thanks.
Here's the 6th at Troon Portland from 1923 from this thread -http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,35479.0.html



Looks a bit 'scruffier' than the photos of Worcester and The Worcestershire I posted above. But then again the Portland photo was taken a few years earlier and the terrain is coastal rather than inland. But then again the bunkering in this 1927 photo (below) of The Worcestershire doesn't exactly show manicured bunkering!

Maintenance regimes, timing, budgets and all that.
atb

The Portland course had quite similar bunker style to Moortown.  If there wasn't a natural depression available, Dr Mac was willing to employ pop-up bunkers.  Much of the bunker work at Worcester is quite similar to what Dr Mac built...just the wavy edges have smoothed. 

Ciao

[Ally Mcintosh]

Thanks Thomas Dai,


Those pictures of Malvern and Worcester look much more like the bunkering style that was then employed in MacKenzie's later courses overseas whilst the Portland course bunkers are much more like his early works, popped-up with earthworks much more obvious in nature.

[Ronald Montesano]

Talk about schizophrenia...Dr. Mac USA vs. Dr. Mac GBI vs. Dr. Mac OZZ


One of the most thoughtful questions, and not one that can be applied to many architects.


Who of the current crop of architects has had these opportunities? And how many would have plural opps in each locale, as did Dr. Mac?