Commentaries, Interviews & Profiles
An Interview by Lenny Giteck The path to extending the Environmental Protection Agency's Energy Star certification program to the pool and spa industry was neither short nor smooth: It took the industry fully five years to convince Energy Star to certify variable-speed pumps. That important step began about a year ago, and now six manufacturers have earned certification for various energy-efficient pool-pump models. The Energy Star program was created in 1992. A joint effort by the EPA and the U.S. Department of Energy, it seeks to identify, certify and promote consumer products that are energy-efficient. In many cases, certified products consume up to a third less energy as compared to products that
Interview by Jim McCloskey When you ask David Tisherman what it takes to design at the highest levels, the answer comes back in a hurry: “Three things,” he says: “education, inspiration and travel.” The first two, he observes, come from hard work in classrooms; close observation of design precedent and the setting; and having an open, inquisitive mind when it comes to sizing up the client and the client’s capacity to get
Interview by Jim McCloskey In his role in developing business for Olympic Pool Plastering of Norcross, Ga., Shawn Still has spent a lot of time in front of classrooms for trade groups, including the National Plasterers Council, the Association of Pool & Spa Professionals and Genesis 3. His next educational venture, in which he partners with Shawn Hayes of Delta Performance Products (Covington, Ga.) to teach “ART: The Color of Water,” will be part of the first-ever weekend of
Interview by Jim McCloskeyMark Holden smiles a lot these days, happy with the progress he, David Tisherman and a group of fellow instructors have made in the very short time they’ve been organizing a new educational program. That program, called Artistic Resources & Training – or ART for short – is a spinoff of his years of trying to make the study of watershapes part of the curriculum taught to students of landscape architecture in American universities. Holden is a perpetual-motion machine these days, pulling together
Late in 2001, WaterShapes columnist Brian Van Bower wrote passionately about innovation and the value he saw in pursuing trends, accepting change and moving steadily forward. As we stand at another set of crossroads a decade later, the foundation he defined back then has
Back in the November/December 2001 issue of WaterShapes, David Tisherman wrote a manifesto urging pool-industry professionals as well as watershapers from related trades to elevate their games – especially with respect to matters of design and presentation. ‘Here’s the unvarnished truth,’
In 2001, as part of his ‘Aqua Culture’ column in WaterShapes, Brian Van Bower penned a thought-provoking piece entitled “Quality Don’t Come Easy.” In it, he decried what he saw as a dearth of quality craftspeople in the watershaping trades — and in the broader construction industry as well. “Time and again,” he noted, “I commiserate with colleagues who just can’t find good people who are dedicated to
In the first installment of this two-part opinion piece, watershaper and educator Mark Holden offered a scathing critique of what he views as the traditional pool industry. To read Part One in its entirety, click here. In the second installment of his two-part opinion piece, Holden offers
A few years ago, I made a conscious effort to turn my back on the narrow confines of the swimming pool industry and to focus instead on the profession of watershaping and its significantly broader foundation and expressive potential. It was a transition pushed both by
Pool-Finish Stains Tarnish the Entire Industry