A Golf Course Architech Striving For Perfection

Tony Ristola is a golf course designer whose method is quite unique...he will only work on one golf course project at a time. In Germany he has designed Artland Golf Club and the ten hole extension for G.C. Emstal. A former tournament and teaching professional, he learned the design/construction trade by building courses for Jack Nicklaus, Dye Designs and Kosti Kuronen in the United States, Mexico, and Finland.

What is your opinion of golf courses in Germany?

There are good and bad projects in every country. The more time a truly qualified golf course architect spends on the project during construction, the better the result. It's that simple. Unfortunately many projects either have had unqualified designers, or designers who were too busy with too many projects too attend to the details. It's the same story everywhere.

If lack of attention makes poor courses, what makes a superior golf course?

The best golf courses start with an exceptional piece of property. The designer must then explore its dramatic points and create as much variety as possible. The greens must be perfect in every way and the bunkers must have a personality all their own. But without creating solid shot values, interesting holes and playability for all levels of players, the golf course will never be considered great. Look at all the truly great golf courses and they all have a very strong sense of individuality. They follow no standard for greatness because there isn't one. All the great courses are distinct. They are bold. They beautify the landscape and nine of the top ten were built on sand. This bodes well for opportunities in north Germany.

Why do you believe North Germany is the best hope for great golf courses?

It's the sand. A significant part of this region has a soil or subsoil which has a high sand content. This allows for very intricate work. It's especially beneficial around the greens. Sandy soils drain superbly and are inexpensive to work, therefore modest budgets go a long way. If you don't create a great golf course, you can definately create something first class. Sandy soil is the dream material for an architect with a vivid imagination.

Which of course we assume you have?

(Laughs) I think Artland Golf Club and the ten hole extension for Golf Club Emstal (Lingen) speak for themselves. I would stack them against anyone's body of work. Nicklaus, Dye, the big boys. Don't take my word for it though, please go judge for yourself. They didn't cost an arm and a leg to build and they won't be expensive to maintain, even though it may look like it. They are interesting, beautiful, maintainable and most importantly playable for all classes of golfers, from beginner to professional. Artland, for example, is maintained by a staff of three people. The superintendent Joseph Offers, has done an amazing job with with such a limited staff. Three people for 18 holes is unheard of in North America.

How is it possible to be significantly cheaper in the design game?

First, my design fee isn't $1 million... Yet (smiles). Actually, I'm very affordable. Second, I'm there everyday and can make all the necessary alterations during the construction process. Moving material twice or three times costs money. Also, I don't have to work with a golf course construction company. This also saves money. For most of Artland and all of G.C. Emstal the shaping work was completed by guys fresh from road construction. You would never know it though. The key was being there to provide direction and to communicate, communicate, communicate. We communicated on a daily basis. Being there on a daily basis is the design/construction industry's answer to the goal of better, faster, cheaper. The goal which every industry strives to accomplish.

How many projects will you be able to handle at one time?

One. Having a mass of projects where I would be visiting' them occasionally has no appeal to me. I want each of my projects to have my own personal signature. I want to control quality, not quantity. Excellence is the goal.

Why is being there so important?

If we take the top 100 courses in the world, according to a U.S. golf publication, 75 of the 100 were built before 1935. This was a period when horse, mule and man were the construction power. The construction process was damn slow. This gave the architect a lot of time to think about the design and make the necessary changes in the design details while the work was in process. Today the construction process is amazingly fast. What took weeks at the turn of the century now only takes a fraction of the time. There is another problem. The machines we use tend to make everything look the same from one course to the next. So even if we can turn flat land into rolling land easily, it is difficult to create individuality. That is why being there is so important. To take advantage of every opportunity and create individuality.

You talk a lot about details. What details?

You can take everything, and I mean everything and fine tune it. Adjust it. Make it as good as possible. You name it and you can improve on it. This is true in every industry from automobiles to computers. In golf it's strategy, bunker forms, bunker positions, tee positions, foot paths, fairway contours, greens contours, contours around the greens, balancing the design etc. There is so much to consider. The paper plans are like a paint by number kit. You can have a course built that way, but don't expect anything special. A true work of art, something first class must have time spent on it by the artist. The guys sitting in the machines doing the construction work don't know golf and certainly can't read the mind of an architect from looking at a piece of paper. That's my job. Communicating the design intent. They get reliable information directly from the mouth of the horse. There is a name for this design style, it's called ‘hands-on design'.

How about the environmental restrictions. How do they affect your design?

It is one of the first things I want to find out about a site. Where the environmentally sensitive areas and other areas which could cause design problems are. These areas strongly influence the design. In Lingen we worked with the city biologist, BUND and the water control office for the Ems River. During construction we met every week or every other week. We can all laugh now but there were some very tense moments during the early weeks of construction, especially with the biologist and BUND. The property was this barren piece of farmland with some large groups of trees and modest elevation changes, but the character of the property was destroyed from years of farming. This was obvious because framing the farmland at both ends were these incredibly beautiful old dune landscapes created by the Ems. These dunes are a §28 natural reserve (naturschutzgebiet). I walked these dune areas, and studied them during planning and during construction. My goal was to bring that natural feel to the golf course. The environmentalists feared we would leave the land as flat as a pancake. Once we got the construction process rolling and they got a taste of some completed work, they became great supporters. They saw the land being restored to a version of its original beauty, a connection with the §28 properties. As Mr. Alves from BUND often said later, `there has been a great misunderstanding.' I know if you asked them they would all agree the course surpassed their wildest hopes.