Chris, have you ever heard of the Unified TKD group? Some years ago I made the acquaintance of a guy that belongs to the organization. Apparently they created some forms using stylistic choices from BOTH the KKW and ITF forms, supposedly as a bridge for the two groups to work together and perhaps eventually unify.
If you are referring to the group that is based out of Canada (UTI, Unified Tae Kwon Do International) then I have heard of them. I wouldn't say I'm
familiar with them as I've only seen a bit of their stuff, but I know who they are. The notion that they were going to serve as a bridge for the ITF and WTF/KKW, which I have heard before, is ... intersting, to say the least.
I thought the forms were meh, but the idea was interesting.
I've only seen a couple of their forms but I agree with your assessment. They are performed akin to an older ITF style, as opposed to anything from even perhaps the 1980's, and I wouldn't say they were very close to KKW guidelines either. YMMV if you've seen more than a few demonstrations of them.
I have seen
very few people actually perform both ITF and KKW Taekwon-Do in any meaningful way when they say they do both styles. Usually they do both pattern sets but in an identical way or end up bring a mish-mash of both styles. This is problematic in the sense that each has a different manner of generating power, moving the body, chambering for techniques, executing kicks, etc. It's not problematic in that people aren't free to do it, it's problematic
for me in that I don't know what they're trying to accomplish or, rather, I don't know if it's possible to any great extent. I tend to think of Taekwon-Do and Taekwondo as two different martial arts, though I know that's not necessarily popular to do these days. At the very least they are different styles of a common system. How does one perform sine wave while moving in KKW stances? Which chambers should you perform when executing blocks, especially knife-hand guarding blocks? What happens to the twist in a yop cha girigi when KKW folks do "side kicks"? Andy says he views ITF Taekwon-Do as being more karate like when he sees its patterns but to me KKW TKD forms appear more karate-ish in how they are performed. (Maybe we're both right in some sense?)
I suppose the UTI's idea of taking elements from both would be like a karate group deciding it's going to combine elements of disparate systems. Mabuni pulled it off in Shito Ryu. But I don't know how successful the UTI has been, speaking as an outsider. I know I couldn't make any sort of meaningful rapproachment between the two styles. To do so would, I think, would require years of study and a very high level of proficiency in each.
Pax,
Chris
