To me this question is pretty simple or it can be! Certainly the process of answering the question can be.
The first thing to do is document the holes on the golf course as to who did what, when and why (that is if you can).
Then with that information you do an analysis of the quality of the holes regardless of who did them and how they play individually and together as a whole. You do it or hire an architect who understands those architects and get him to help you analyze the holes and do it and make some decisions together.
Then you start to decide what to do about the individual holes. I can't really imagine why a golf club, at any time, would hire Tillinghast to do his style of architecture on a Raynor/Banks course or vice versa!
But the sad truth is not a single one of those famous and well known architects EVER came into a golf course and tried to stay with the same style of another architect. The only time that ever happened is if the two architects happened to have the same basic style in the first place.
And that's basically a fact that I'd challenge anyone to prove otherwise! Just show me a course where a Tillinghast ever would have tried to stay with the "character" and style of Raynor or vice versa! I'll bet you will never find a single example! And that sort of thing goes for every single architect I ever heard of--that is up until maybe 15-20 years ago Again, that sort of thing never happened until maybe 15-20 years ago when restoration first started to appear on the scene.
Previously every architect I've ever heard of basically did his own thing regardless of who built the course in the first place or who did what later!
But again, I can't imagine why any golf course at anytime in their evolution would have hired Tillinghast to do holes on a Raynor course or vice versa but apparently that happened.
So, once the quality of the holes has been established (that is if they're good) the club should just go with the styles they created and evolved into on that course during their evolution and live with it and forget completely about this thing called "continuity" or "staying in character" today.
The thought of wiping out some good Tillinghast holes to stay "in character" with Raynor's style or wiping out Raynor's holes to stay in character with Tillinghast is madness to me--that is if all the holes are good--regardless of the "in character" thing!
And believe me, I know from where I speak!
Probably up to seven different architects have been through my course, Gulph Mills, over the years!
And not a single one of them EVER tried to stay "in character" with any other!
But now we know who did what, when and why--we have a completely documented architectural evolution report of every hole and every single thing about every hole from the very beginning (1919) to today!!
The breakdown goes like this;
#1 changed from a par 5 to a 4 by moving the tees and removing and adding some bunkering--probably William Gordon
#2-6 are original Ross!
#7-8 were redesigned by Perry Maxwell
#9 was redesigned by at the green-end by McGovern and then RTJ.
#10 was redesigned by Maxwell at the green-end and later the rest of the hole was redone by RTJ.
#11 was redesigned by Maxwell
#12 redesigned by RTJ on the second half
#13 redesigned by RTJ on the first half
#14 redesigned by Maxwell
15-18 are original Ross
And furthermore, through that mid-section of the course, and a few other places there are a number of things from Wayne Stiles, William Gordon, RTJ and even Tom Fazio!
And you want to know the most interesting thing of all? All these holes basically went through what I call the "BLIND TASTE TEST for a number of decades!!
Although nobody in the club seemed to really know who did what--the holes that are original Ross and the holes redone by Perry Maxwell have always been the holes that have been most admired and respected by the membership and other people, again, without anyone knowing who did what on the golf course!
So what does that tell you?
It tells me that in the restoration that we're doing right now we'll do our best to PRESERVE and RESTORE both Donald Ross AND Perry Maxwell, and also do our best to return the other holes that were altered by the other architects (with their own styles) to the look of Ross (or Maxwell) as best we can!
Were the Ross holes and the Maxwell holes EVER in "continuity" or in the "same character"?
NO!! But who cares? They're all good holes and they play very well individually and together despite the look of them!
Some of Ross's bunkering actually doesn't look all that different than some of Maxwells bunkering (at least not after decades of maintenance) so it looks like the overall bunker style will be a little more Ross overall than Maxwell!
That will probably be the only real concession to "continuity". But I'm hoping when we do our next aerial that the Maxwell bunkers from the air will look as different from the Ross bunkers (from the air) as they always have!
But the greens? They're going to be clearly preserved as the Maxwells we have and the Rosses we have and there isn't much similarity in those two styles, that's for sure!
There actually is one new entry in this restoration process. That's our #7 green that was a Maxwell redesign on which Maxwell basically made a mistake in concept and the green and green-end was unpopular and it was redesigned again and basically was never improved and never really right. But through lots of research and a bit of deduction I would stake my life on what Maxwell was doing, what he wanted to do, and exactly how he made a mistake at the green-end.
So in the last month Gil Hanse redid #7 green to look like and play like what I'd stake my life on was Maxwell's original redesign ideas for that hole or what he would have done if he'd been able to! And from what I can see Gil did a helluva job of staying "in character" with Maxwell!! Matter of fact we went around to the other Maxwell greens on the course and sort of picked out some internal contours and such and reused them by flipping the postioning around and such. I think this hole, because of the green-end redo, will now really work great after being a one dimensional hole for decades!
So that's how I would handle a situation like that and that's how I'd answer a question like this one!
Jim Finegan said something about the way our course is now after all that's happened there over the decades.
"Gulph Mills is a mongrel but it's a wonderful mongrel!!"
So through this restoration were just gettin rid of some of the flees and we're sticking with our wonderful mongrel, at least we're sticking with the blood that's good blood!
And the fact that the good blood passed the "blind taste test of time" is all the more proof that we're doing the right thing!
So that's one example--but I should add that Perry Maxwell's style is certainly not the same as Ross's style but it sure as hell was a lot closer to Ross than Raynor's style was to Tillinghast's style!