interview
Design Q&A:
Dr Martin Hawtree One of the most significant names in golf course architecture, the Hawtree firm has been in existence since 1912. Starting life under the command of FG Hawtree, the company been responsible for over 750 courses around the world and now works closely with the R&A in tweaking classic courses for Open Championship play. Alex Jenkins sat down with FG's grandson, Dr Martin Hawtree, to discuss his ongoing work at the Hong Kong Golf Club, his results at Royal Birkdale and St Andrews and his much publicized new course – the Trump International Golf Links Scotland
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K: You were asked to produce an audit of the three courses at the Hong Kong Golf Club. Can you explain what that entails? MH: When I become involved at a golf club for the first time I try and work my way into the course by producing an audit, which in this case is a substantial piece of work. An audit is essentially a detailed assessment of the golf course. In addition, we do an audit commentary, which is a range of recommendations that I prefer to call options or opportunities. A spot analysis highlights the strengths and weaknesses of a course. When I do this kind of operation, people think we're going to make recommendations regardless, but I've been in the business long enough now to know that it's not always necessary to change things. HK: What were your first impressions of the Hong Kong Golf Club? MH: I was here four years ago, just after the Hong Kong Open. I was very impressed with the whole site. It really is magnificent. There are stretches of holes that I found not so good and there are some holes that I found to be outstanding. What I found was a lack of homogeneity between the styles of the golf courses. I'm very impressed with the look of the eighteenth on the Old Course. It reminds me of a number of great holes in England. Certainly, the courses here are far from typical Asian layouts. I've spent a lot of time working through the layouts at Fanling, particularly the Eden. That course has a wonderful series of early holes but there are some things there that I'm 64
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not entirely happy with. Overall, I feel there is immense potential. It's a very interesting piece of detective work. HK: Is it fair to say that most of your work now is restoration? MH: We've always done a lot of restoration, but we needed the new work to help subsidize that. Restoration work isn't always remunerative. But I've always enjoyed working on existing golf courses. There are two that have given me the most pleasure and satisfaction – largely because I was given immense freedom to do what was needed. The first was Lahinch and the second was Toronto Golf Club, which we worked on last year. Toronto is a [Harry] Colt course. I could see him in the layout but not in the detail of the course. It wasn't a total renovation but we changed the changed the green surrounds, the bunkers and had all the roughs regrassed to get away from the Bluegrass syndrome. The Bluegrass only ever provided one type of shot – the lob, so we changed that. HKGOLFER.COM
HK: When you do restoration work, are you putting yourself into the shoes of the original architect? MH: Very much so. I found criticism of my work at Toronto on various websites and blogs extraordinary. I was criticized for being late Colt and not early Colt. If I reproduced a Colt circa 1913 I don't believe any of the members would have been at all happy with what I had done. The same with Lahinch. I wasn't slavishly trying to copy [Dr Alister] MacKenzie as we had no plans to work from. It's more about looking at the golf course for the next thirty to forty years but with the architect over my shoulder. At Toronto there are constant reminiscences of Colt – the style and position of the bunkers, the slopes at the back of the greens. So there's a bit of me in it and a bit of Colt in it and now the members are very happy with it. I'm doing it for them and not to please a whole lot of critics on the internet. HK: You've done a lot of work with the R&A on several Open courses, including installing the new back tee on the seventeenth at St Andrews, which has received some scrutiny. MH: I assisted. It wasn't my original idea; I simply designed the tee. I understand why the R&A wanted it. Whether or not the R&A allowed as much additional width to the fairway I'm not sure. My original suggestion was much more width than I think they allowed. But we work very closely with the R&A. We've just finished quite a lot of alterations at Hoylake [Royal Liverpool Golf Club, host of the 2014 Open Championship] and previously did work at Royal Birkdale. We added a lot of bunkers and new tees at Birkdale, but only changed one green – the seventeenth, which created a little controversy when the club held the Open in 2008.
HK: What's your view on the equipment versus golf course debate? Are modern courses unnecessarily long? MH: I'd quite like to see a tournament ball. For the vast majority of players and club members new equipment has probably given them more enjoyment. I'm not against that at all. What distresses me is the number of wonderful courses that have faded out of the circuit because they're not long enough. Toronto Golf Club is an example. It was designed as 6,400 yards in 1911. That would have been some challenge back then, the equivalent of over 7,000 yards today.
Colt in Canada: Hawtree's recent restoration work at the Toronto Golf Club, a Harry Colt Design, has been highly praised by the club's membership.
HK: You seem to be one of the few architects that has a lot of work on – in Europe especially. You haven't felt the need, like many other designers, to head into mainland China in search of new projects? MH: No. We did look at China seriously a couple of years ago and came out to the golf show in Guangzhou, but as you say, we've got quite a lot of work already. We have a project in India at Lucknow and we have a new one near Orleans in France. And of course we have the Trump course, which is certainly going to keep us busy. HK: The Trump course – or to give it its full title, the Trump International Golf Links Scotland – has received an enormous amount of publicity, with Trump himself coming out and saying that he expects the course to host an Open Championship. What do you make of that? MH: It's a race for him to get the Open or the US Open on one of his courses. He's certainly going to have space for an Open. It's a huge
Courtesy of Hawtree Ltd (Hawtree & Toronto GC)
HK: Many of the players reacted quite strongly to the severity of that green. MH: Some of the players didn't like it and some of them loved it. But you're right, there were strong reactions. There are a few things I'd like to change there – the removal of the spectator mounds at the back of the green being one. The hole played as one of the easiest during the Open because the R&A were terrified of putting pins in difficult locations. They put them in easy places, which was reflected in the scoring. HK: Was there a feeling of vindication when Harrington hit that 5-wood to set up eagle there to win? MH: Absolutely. HKGOLFER.COM
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site. He ca n i nt roduce t he infrastructure and he has all the length and space in the world to produce a very challenging and very dramatic site. But it's up to the powers that be if that ever happens. It's not going to happen for the next few years, that's certain. I think it might get tested out by hosting some of the major amateur events once it opens in 2012.
HK: What is Mr Trump like to work with? MH: I get on very well with him. Our characters and temperaments are at the opposite ends of the spectrum, which seems to work. I find him a good client. He's always asking questions and he has huge energy. Last time he was there – at the
HK: Given his public persona, which comes through on programmes like The Apprentice, you're not scared of saying 'no' to any ideas he comes up with? MH: No - I have said 'no' to him. He did have an idea of having a nineteenth hole. Because of the tee site on the eighteenth it left the green a fair way from the clubhouse, so he thought of having a nineteenth hole to get back to the clubhouse. I gave a firm, "No, Mr Trump!" and he said, "OK, OK." HK: How excited are you by the project? MH: Very. It'll either make or break me [laughs]. The site is magnificent. It's like Royal Aberdeen, Royal Birkdale and Cruden Bay all rolled into one and times two. I'm constantly amazed by the size of the dunes. They're bigger than anything I've ever seen.
AFP (Trump & TIGLS)
Trumped: The Donald (top) is a good client, says Hawtree; the site of the Trump International Golf Links Scotland, near Aberdeen
H K : H ow d i d yo u b e c o m e involved? MH: Through the R&A, which was a result of our work with Open courses. At the start, I wasn't the lead architect, I was really the consultant. But Tommy Fazio Jr, who has done many of Trump's courses in the States, became busy with other projects and it was handed over to me.
end of May – he came off the plane, did a number of press conferences and then we spent six hours on the site nonstop. In its current state, it's a pretty rugged site and he is 63 or thereabouts, so he has a huge amount of energy. But I enjoy working with him. He stimulates me and I give him ideas. I'm not very fond of working with planned consortiums who are just putting up the money for something. He [Trump] has definite engagement with the project.
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