Memory Lane
It’s not a story I tell very often, but my wife and I spent our honeymoon not in Hawaii, not in Paris, not even at Niagara Falls.  No, instead we went to Pittsburgh.  We’d scheduled our wedding for August dates without consulting my eastern relations, the principle among them my Aunt Genevieve, my own family’s matriarch and in all ways a formidable woman.  As it turned out, she’d scheduled
Test Your Knowledge #50
U.S. Marine Corps Water Survival Instructor Explains S.A.F.E. Plan
Tank Command
In many ways, installing a surge tank is simple.  If you get it right, all will be well.  As is the case with so many watershape systems, however, getting it wrong can lead to serious problems. Let’s start with some terminology.  Surge tanks are receptacles used to accommodate the surge of displaced water in systems that can be generally defined as
Planting a Pool
When these clients decided that they wanted to have a swimming pool, they knew above all else that they did not want another box of blue water.   By contrast, as avid patrons of Disney World, the Princeton, N.J., homeowners had decided that their pool should be what they called “Disney natural” – not as completely naturalistic as a real pond, but natural enough so that they and their children could
Watershaping, Green-Style
Last time, I mentioned the fact that many of my design clients these days are environmentally aware and want to make certain I can help them devise landscapes and hardscape treatments that make sense in eco-friendly ways. To at least the same extent, clients who contact us at The Green Scene (Northridge, Calif.) want us to work with their pool, spa, fountain and pond designs in the same way:  They want us to minimize the
Real-World Watershaping
In the past year, I’ve written Travelogues for WaterShapes EXTRA about the reflecting pool on the Capitol Mall in Washington, D.C., and the fountain at Point State Park in Pittsburgh.  In researching these watershapes and looking for suitable video links after selecting them for coverage and starting to write about them, I learned that both had been closed for renovation as I was pulling things together. Apologies for the timing – although I’m reasonably confident
Ripples #61
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Ripples #60
Compiled and Written by Lenny Giteck   London Aquatics Centre Named Year’s ‘Most-Hard-to-Miss Design’
Test Your Knowledge #49
MTV: Rambunctious ‘Rednecks’ Create Swimming Pool from Unlikely Vehicle
Completely Contemporary
It’s a rare project in which a watershaper has the opportunity to execute a complete design without compromise. In our Scottsdale, Ariz.-based business, we often work with upscale clients on custom pool and spa installations, and it seems that there’s always some element or other in the design that ends up being altered or left out.  It sometimes reaches the point where we start to feel as though