“Everybody who plays this game has heard of Dr Alister MacKenzie. Hardly anyone has heard of David Edel. But a throwaway line over a post-round drink in Argentina a decade ago could see the names of these two inextricably linked for generations to come.”
GOLF AUSTRALIA, October 2010
Read the article to find out how DeVries Designs are involved in bringing this lost course to life. Golf Australia, October 2010: MacKenzie’s Lost Designs (PDF)
One of the most influential architects in the game's history, Alister MacKenzie got his start in the United States by building a little-known but brilliant design in Northern California.
Traverse City’s Mike DeVries has gone from mowing fairways at Frankfort’s tony Crystal Downs to designing some of Northern Michigan’s sweetest links. This year GolfWeek Magazine named the DeVries-designed Greywalls course in Marquette No. 3 in the state, and Kingsley Club, just south of Traverse City, No. 20 of the Best Modern Courses in the nation. We caught up with the wunderkind between trips to Texas, where he’s carrying out the decades-lost design of a course MacKenzie masterminded in 1930.
Eighty years ago, the game’s greatest architect drew up plans for a golf course unlike anything the world has known. Long forgotten, the design has recently come to light, and an effort is under way to get the course built in the U.S.
Having grown up working at Crystal Downs in northern Michigan, I have had an appreciation of Perry Maxwell’s work for a long time. Perry’s work as Alister MacKenzie’s associate on that venerable course certainly had a great effect on his work and philosophy, as he spent three seasons there building the course now regarded as one of the best in the world. Maxwell’s respect for a landscape’s inherent qualities and use of those features in its design is one of the great aspects of the golf course at Crystal Downs. I became enamored with golf at an early age and with golf course architecture because of my exposure to Crystal Downs. I am certain that the beauty of the natural landforms of the site were an inspiration to Perry Maxwell just as they are to me to this day and I am positive that he made the course better due to his recognition of the intricacies of the land.
DeVries' influences appear Crystal clear
