Davis Love III needs no introduction. But just in case, he’s a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame, has logged over 20 PGA Tour victories, won the 1997 PGA Championship, was twice victorious at The Players Championship and is a two-time Ryder Cup captain. He’s also a tournament founder (the PGA Tour’s RSM…Read More Read More

James Duncan came to the U.S. from his native Denmark in the early 1990s to learn the craft of building golf courses. He learned from the best, working first with Tom Doak and Renaissance Golf Design, then joining with Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw to help construct courses like East Hampton, Old Sandwich, Bandon Trails,…Read More Read More

Designer Troy Miller worked for Landmark Land Co. for a decade, building golf courses around North America, before leaving the company to settle down in his hometown of Charleston, SC. The move put him in a unique position to do something he’d first envisioned years before: help the city rebuild the popular but dated municipal…Read More Read More

PGA Tour and current PGA Champions tour player Tom Lehman, winner of the 1996 Open Championship at Royal Lytham & St. Anne’s, has seamlessly managed to maintain an elite game while developing a golf course design outlook that almost entirely eschews consideration of elite players. Lehman stops by the Salon to speak with Golf Digest…Read More Read More

In a limited amount of original work, David Kahn has proven to be one of the most creative, courageous and expressionistic golf course architects working today. Along with partner Tim Jackson, the other half of Jackson Kahn Design, he’s reimagined the shaping and visage of the historic Dunes Course at Monterey Peninsula Country Club, built…Read More Read More

Canadian designer Ian Andrew, Feed the Ball guest from Episode 14, is back to visit with Derek Duncan and Jim Urbina. The conversation turns to topics of: –Choose Your Own Adventure golf architecture; –The satisfactions of playing “unknown” courses; –Golf as an emotional experience; –The importance of “compression and release” in design; –Creativity beginning with…Read More Read More

Larry Lambrecht has been one of golf’s most prolific and talented photographers for over 30 years. He’s shot golf courses and tournaments, as well as Super Bowls, World Series and other major sporting events, for virtually ever major publication. He’s also published a number of books and club histories along with his course photography, including,…Read More Read More

Golf course architect Forrest Richardson was elected in 2020 to be the 75th president of the American Society of Golf Course Architects, a chair that’s been held by such notable designers as Stanley Thompson, Robert Trent Jones, William Langford (twice), Rees Jones, Robert Trent Jones, Jr., Alice Dye, Jeff Brauer and Steve Smyers. He joins…Read More Read More

Architect Kyle Phillips began his illustrious career as an associate working for Robert Trent Jones II in California. He gained unique design and planning expertise working on a slate of international courses for Jones, which later helped him garner major overseas jobs once he opened his own firm in the late 90s. Those include Kingsbarns…Read More Read More

Few people in golf have had as rich or wide-ranging life in golf as Donald Steel. He began his career as the golf reporter for London’s Sunday Telegraph in 1961, memorably covering, as a rookie writer, Arnold Palmer’s back-to-back Open Championship wins at Birkdale and Troon. A few years later, while continuing his reporting duties,…Read More Read More

Golf architect Chris Wilczynski has bridged two distinct eras–that of the course-a-day, turn and burn construction frenzy of the 1990s and 2000s, and now the current period of “slow” golf with its focus on boutique operations and club restoration. He began his career as an associate with Arthur Hills, one of the busiest designers of…Read More Read More

After working for over a decade for Tom Fazio, Tim Jackson opened his own West Coast design firm with David Kahn, another Fazio alum. Jackson Kahn Design is known for their creative, ambitious ideas about design–as exhibited at, Monterey Peninsula Country Club’s Shore Course and The Other Course and The Bad Little Nine at Scottsdale…Read More Read More

Lester George was an artillery officer in the U.S. Army who rose to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. In the late 1980s, already into his 30s, he made a career switch to golf design, setting up a business in his native state of Virginia. In the mid-1990s he was introduced to a magnificent property outside…Read More Read More

Golf designer Dana Fry began his career learning the business as an associate for Tom Fazio, and later forged a prominent partnership with Dr. Michael Hurdzan. With Hurdzan he created such top U.S. courses as Erin Hills, site of the 2017 U.S. Open, and Calusa Pines in Florida. Today he runs his business with partner…Read More Read More

It’s not unreasonable to suggest the path of golf architecture in the second half of the 20th century can be traced through Ron Kirby. His career has been a remarkable Zelig-like whirlwind placing him in the immediate proximity of Dick Wilson, Robert Trent Jones, Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus and many others. His name is on…Read More Read More

Rees Jones‘ design work has touched public, resort, club golf and major championship golf as much as any architect of the modern era. He enters the Salon to talk with Jim Urbina and Derek Duncan about balancing the many voices that weigh in on projects in the “remodeling era,” constructing on technically challenging sites vs…Read More Read More

From the original course at Bandon Dunes to The Castle Course at St. Andrews, to Gamble Sands in Washington and then to Mammoth Dunes in Wisconsin, David McLay Kidd has been one of the most innovative and courageous course designers of this generation. He joins Derek Duncan and Jim Urbina in the Salon to discuss…Read More Read More

Bruce Hepner and Jim Urbina both began working for Tom Doak at Renaissance Design in the early 1990s, spending many days and hours together on the road for well over a decade. Hepner opened his own business in 2012 and is now one of the most admired renovation and restoration specialists in the business. He…Read More Read More

Few people in the golf design business knew Pete Dye better than Bobby Weed, who first interned for his mentor in the 1970s. Weed comes into the Salon with Derek Duncan and Jim Urbina to share his thoughts on how Dye continues to influence him, the overriding consideration of drainage, being courted by Jack Nicklaus,…Read More Read More

In this volume of the Salon, architect Gil Hanse sits with Derek Duncan and Jim Urbina to discuss how he and design partner Jim Wagner build golf courses. They talk about the sanctity of being on machinery, if routing is more vital to a good course than shaping, the importance of “cooling off,” the importance…Read More Read More

Architect Mike DeVries steps into the Salon with Jim Urbina and Derek Duncan to discuss arguably the granddaddy of all design topics, routing. The long and winding conversation touches on the exposures of Cape Wickham, sacrificing extraordinary holes for the sake of rhythm and continuity, routing around natural greensites, if routing is a skill that…Read More Read More

Thad Layton, principal at Arnold Palmer Design Company, enters the Salon to talk to Derek Duncan and Jim Urbina about Palmer and the rules of architecture. Specifically the discussion revolves around fundamental rules, when it’s advisable to break them, whether it’s ever permissible to design crossing holes, working within the constraints of conservative developers, straight…Read More Read More

Golf course designer and renovation specialist Jeff Mingay enters the Salon to talk about St. Andrews with Jim Urbina and Derek Duncan. The central theme is, if The Old Course is so great, why aren’t there more courses that are like it? Topics include the importance of boundaries to traditional golf expectations, blind tee shots,…Read More Read More

Designer Bill Coore comes into the salon to discuss greens and putting surfaces with Jim Urbina and Derek Duncan. Topics include the importance of shaping greens and surrounds in relation to single holes or the entire golf course, the 14th and 2nd greens at Sand Hills, building “floating” greens and finding natural landforms, looking vs.…Read More Read More

Jim Urbina and Derek Duncan discuss George Thomas, Pete Dye’s par-5 holes, Riviera, the Ghost Tree at Old Macdonald, whether bunkers have become too sanitized, “reasonable” green speeds, Stimpmeter readings from the 1970s. Then Don Mahaffey enters the salon to talk about the beautiful simplicity of Mike Nuzzo’s Wolf Point, the PGA Tour’s bunker sand…Read More Read More