This is a list of golf course architects and golf course design firms. Golf course architecture is a specific discipline of landscape design, with many architects represented in the United States by the American Society of Golf Course Architects.
Some architects are highly successful professional golfers who went on to design golf courses. This is a dynamic list and may never be able to satisfy particular standards for completeness. You can help by adding missing items with reliable sources.
1 Arnold Palmer, legendary golfer and architect 2 Willie Park, Jr., professional golfer, golf writer, businessman, golf club designer, and golf course architect 3 Jerry Pate 4 Steve Pate 5 Agustin Piza 6 Gary Player 7 Ross Perrett, also a brilliant artist with oils and watercolour. 8 Bill Powell 9 Jimmy Powell, golfer and architect 10 Ron Prichard
Jim Lipe focuses on greens, surrounds, bunkers and tees at Mexican resort. Non-native trees removed and native prairie grasses, shrubs and wildflowers replanted at Ohio club. Main feature considers whether the golf industry is ready to embrace non-18-hole golf courses.
Robert Trent Jones Sr.DiedJune 14, 2000 (aged 93) Fort Lauderdale, FloridaNationalityEnglish–AmericanAlma materCornell UniversityOccupationArchitect7 more rows
The first ever 18-hole course was constructed at St Andrews in 1764, establishing the now recognised standard for the game.
Ross had $2 in his pocket when he disembarked on U.S. soil. James Tufts hired Ross as the head professional at Pinehurst in 1900. He would design the first four courses at the resort with the famed No. 2 course, completed in 1907, as his signature creation.
The 1910s and 1920s were a time of rapid growth for golf, as economic prosperity and increased leisure time spurred the growth of country clubs and golf courses.
July 6, 1895 - Van Cortlandt Park Golf Course opens - the first public golf course in America. The Country Club of Rochester is founded.
The first golf course in the United States was Oakhurst Links, built in 1884 in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia. It was originally a six hole track which was later expanded to nine holes. Oakhurst was the first course and golf club in the United States.
H.S. Colt, as he's often referred to, is a Golden Age architect with a whopping 11 course design credits appearing on the Top 100. That's three more than any other architect on the list. Mackenzie and Old Tom Morris come in second with eight apiece, while Tillinghast is fourth with seven designs.
The Donald Ross Course is open for the season! The Donald Ross Course allows golfers to step back in time and experience the game the way it was meant to be played. Built in 1917, this award-winning course designed by renowned architect Donald Ross maintains many elements of its classic design today.
Donald J. RossPinehurst ResortClub informationDesigned byDonald J. Ross Robert Trent Jones, Sr. (1974 renovation) Bill Coore & Ben Crenshaw (2010 renovation)Par70 (72)Length7,588 yards (6,938 m)Course rating76.567 more rows
Like other sports there was an extraordinary increase in the popularity of Golf in the 1920s. In the past, golf had been viewed as a sport exclusively for the upper class, but in the 1920s the game appealed to the middle class. Between 1916 and 1920 the number of weekend golfers doubled to one-half million.
In golf, it refers to building a new course of any style over an old one on the same site, including major or total re-routing. Courses wanting a true restoration should select an architect on substance, and not nomenclature, finding one who respects design history and has experience in similar restorations.
Pinehurst No. 2 has hosted the 1936 PGA Championship, the 1999 and 2005 U.S. Opens and both the men's and women's 2014 U.S. Opens. It will also serve as the site of the 2024 U.S. Open. Greens fees range from $50 to $495, depending on the time of year and which of the club's courses you play.
Golf course architecture is now seen as a discipline that requires a specialist’s expertise, in the same way as building architecture and landscape architecture.
Also on the Continent, Bernhard Von Limburger amassed a large portfolio of golf courses, particularly throughout Germany, including Club Zur Vahr and Lindau, while Javier Arana, working exclusively in Spain, completed El Saler, recognized as one of the finest courses in Europe, and El Prat.
Alister Mackenzie was also an associate of Harry Colt and is recognized as one of the most influential golf course architects of that era, mainly due to his superb work outside Europe, particularly in Australia and North America. Mackenzie’s brilliance is best known at courses such as Royal Melbourne, Cypress Point and Augusta National but his lasting legacy was in listing the essential features for the design of the ideal golf course which still form the basis of good golf course design today.
Icelandic architect lists the golf courses that have most influenced him.
Brad Klein reports on Matt Dusenberry’s work to make the Michigan layout more playable.
In restoring Baltusrol, Gil Hanse relied on the principle that AW Tillinghast got it right.
The second article in our new series sees the Canadian architect list the courses that have inspired him.
Sand is crucial to golf, but supplies are under pressure. Adam Lawrence considers how the game should respond.
Richard Humphreys reports on European Golf Design’s complete redesign of the course that will host the 2023 Ryder Cup.
The first article in a new GCA series which asks people to list their favourite courses.
Everything was boiler-plated.”. One shining light, toward the end of the 20th century, was Pete Dye, who sought to do the opposite of what the mid-century architects—specifically Robert Trent Jones—had done.
J.H. Taylor also perpetuated this Victorian approach, but, at the same time, challenged it. Around 1910 at Royal Mid-Surrey Golf Club, nine miles west of Big Ben, he built a series of irregular hills and hollows, “the idea being to copy nature as closely as the hand of man admits.”.
Harbour Town (photo by Kevin Murray) Inspired by Dye’s willingness to experiment and follow his own path, one of his acolytes, Bill Coore, more or less instigated another new phase of architecture and bunker-styling with his, and partner Ben Crenshaw’s, pioneering design of Sand Hills in Nebraska in 1995.
MacKenzie, Colt, Tom Simpson, John Abercromby, Tillinghast, C.B. Macdonald, Raynor, George Thomas, Perry Maxwell, Stanley Thompson, Ross, and other Golden Agers on both sides of the Atlantic were now creating attractive bunkers, recognizing that the contrast of sand against turf, water, and shadows was a beautiful thing.
The most prolific cross-bunker builder of the time was Scotland’s Tom Dunn, who laid out well over 100 courses using a formulaic style featuring a fairway-spanning hazard to be cleared with the drive and another for the approach.
There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a Golf Course Architect. For example, did you know that they make an average of $33.68 an hour? That's $70,063 a year!
Golf Course Architects in America make an average salary of $70,063 per year or $34 per hour. The top 10 percent makes over $101,000 per year, while the bottom 10 percent under $48,000 per year.
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Golf course architects come from varying backgrounds, with training in landscape architecture, civil engineering, environmental studies, agronomy, golf course construction and professional golf, to name a few. The most common degree amongst golf architects is landscape architecture.
The most common degree amongst golf architects is landscape architecture. In addition to formal education, time spent “on the job” learning about golf course maintenance and golf course construction is important to learn the technical aspects of the profession.