ARTICLES Archives - Page 138 of 315

Ripples #66

Compiled and edited by Lenny Giteck British Freestyle Record-Setter Guilty of Pool Peeping Tomism

From the beginning of my career as a sculptor, I’ve mostly given myself over to two simple elements – metal and water – and have tried to develop approaches that turn one into an extension of the other. I like the sense that a sheet of flowing water completes the simple stainless steel shapes I create. I also like to play with illusion by creating the impression that

The Birth of a Dream

It’s speculated that the exterior spaces at Playboy Mansion West must be the most photographed in the world. That’s hard to quantify, of course, but it’s certainly safe to say that since construction began in the 1970s, the home of publisher Hugh Hefner and its famous swimming pool and grotto have been used ceaselessly to promote

Pushing Boundaries

Through many of the early “WaterShapes World” blogs, I wrote (perhaps too often?) about what was happening with the WaterShapes franchise and web site and all sorts of grand plans we had to burst back onto the scene with a huge, multilayered portal aimed at serving a broad universe filled by watershapers and their clients and prospects. In reality, we didn’t do much bursting and instead discovered what all sorts of web operations have experienced through the years: Making things happen

A Pool Buyer’s Guide, Part 2

Once you’re as well informed as you can be about the business practices of the companies that might end up designing and installing your swimming pool, the hard work of the decision-making process begins. It’s time, in other words, to bring a few of your candidate companies in, ask them to look things over and, ultimately, request bids for the work to be done. A quick heads up: The prices are going to be all over the map, and that’s because, if you’ve done things the way most homeowners will do, you’ve set up a situation in which

A Recipe for Jambalaya

Truly a large-scale project full of unique technical challenges in an unusual and important civic setting, the renovation of the watershapes at Jambalaya Park in Gonzalez, La., is easily the most unusual project our firm has ever tackled. The park covers seven beautifully wooded acres in an older section of town that’s mostly residential but sits directly behind

Pond Chores

Pond ownership comes with a range of responsibilities, not the least of which has to do with making certain everything is ship-shape at some point before the weather gets very warm in the spring. That’s particularly true if the pond carries a good population of

Jet Setting

People who design and build swimming pools with attached spas are always on the lookout for ways to differentiate themselves in the eyes of the client. The spa, I think, is the perfect place to start. But the cold fact is that a great many watershapers who build spas do so very conservatively, whether out of habit or

Ponds on the Level, Part 2

This is the second of three articles on using auto-fill devices with ponds and watergardens. Auto-fill devices for use in managing water levels in ponds and watergardens come in three main forms: mechanical float valves, electromechanical timed valves and electronic sensing systems. In this article, we’ll take a look at each system and weigh advantages and disadvantages. Let’s tackle price first: Of the three

A Crowning Achievement (pdf version)

In July last year, the city of Chicago unveiled its newest civic landmark: Millennium Park, a world-class artistic and architectural extravaganza in the heart of downtown. At a cost of more than $475 million and in a process that took more than six years to complete, the park transformed a lakefront space once marked by unsightly railroad tracks and ugly parking lots into a civic showcase. The creation of the 24.5-acre park brought together an unprecedented collection of