Hollywood Golf Club

Walter Travis was a man of many talents. As a player he won three U.S. Amateur titles and one British Amateur, and his 80-percent match win percentage ranks among the sport’s all-time best. He was a writer, editor and publisher of The American Golfer in addition to designing over two dozen golf courses. His greatest skill might have been bunkering courses. His work revamping no. 64 Garden City in the early 1900s—adding, moving and deepening the bunkers as well as rebuilding the greens—transformed that course into what it is today, but his most artistic work is at Hollywood. The elaborate bunker shapes and arrangements are nothing short of dazzling, especially as they’ve been sharpened and polished by Brian Schneider of Renaissance Golf, along with shaper Blake Conant. They lay out like arrangements of gemstones and the spots on a jungle cat, varying from the size of a mansion parlor to little more than a bread box. Anything like it attempted today would be considered garish, but Travis’s Beaux Art bunkering at Hollywood is a study in artistry.