ARTICLES Archives - Page 72 of 317

Water Warnings

The summer swim season has arrived, which means I've spent the last week or two coping with the annual flood of stories about how awful and threatening water can be. No matter whether a given story focuses on pools, spas or some other body of water, these items warn people who like to dunk themselves to play, cool off, relax or

Maximizing Exposures

‘I take a lot of pictures of my work – so many, in fact, that friends and colleagues often tease me about it.’ That’s how David Tisherman opened his Details column of June 2003, broaching a subject near and dear to his heart. ‘[W]hat may seem like an obsession to others seems like good, commonsense business practice to me. In fact,’ he continued, ‘I believe that every single designer and builder involved in the creation of quality watershapes should record his or her work photographically – and should make a point of doing so in a way that

The pool and spa have simple shapes, notes Jimmy Reed, but when you're working on a piece of art with an all-tile finish and special stone details, you learn that basic shapes pose unique challenges in design, construction and tile application.

Test For Speed

If I've learned anything through the years, it's that a successful, truly satisfying project generally requires a good client and, quite often, a great project team. What the good client was after in the project discussed here was pretty simple - that is, an oval-shaped pool to go along with a large, oval-shaped shade structure another contractor was to install alongside it. Making a fine start, the client called in Skip Phillips of

Considering Small Spaces

‘Whenever I receive a call for an initial meeting about a potential project,’ began Stephanie Rose in her Natural Companions column of May 2003, ‘I always envision – before the client ever opens his or her mouth – that I will be adorning a multi-acre estate with a classic garden that will someday be written about in books and examined by

This wasn't one of those cases where a popped pool could be coaxed back into place. Instead, Shane LeBlanc had to remove not just one, but two old shells -- and set up a new system while easing any fears city officials might have had about their watershape ever moving again.

Pop Goes the Pool

There are few things in the world of watershaping as dramatic or devastating as a popped pool. On their way up out of the ground, they'll shatter decks and coping, break pipes and conduits and, often, leave cracked shells behind and generally make a terrible mess. They also lead to one big first question from the owner: "So can you make it go back down?" I'm pleased to report that none of the pools I've built has ever risen above its assigned grade, but I live and work in the south, often in areas where

Mystical Moments

For me, one of the highlights of the 20th Anniversary Celebration for Genesis was the place most of us stayed: The Allegretto Vineyard Resort is a spectacular facility created as an extension of the imagination of the property's owner, Douglas Ayres. The hotel embodies an eclectic blend of design concepts, from dashes of feng shui to dollops of talk-to-the-land spiritualism mixed in with

Renovation Time

By Jim McCloskey The weather has taken a turn toward heat in the time since I wrote my last blog: It's been in the 90s several times recently, and it reminds me of an even hotter stretch early in May 1989, when we moved into our current house and settled in as a family with our first swimming pool. When we arrived with our

Nature’s Ways

When a pond's fish shift to spawning mode, all sorts of things start happening in a hurry -- in turn whipping new pond owners into a frenzy right alongside their fish. At these times, Mike Gannon counsels restraint and helps novices recognize and follow what's happening.

After sizing up the situation with the Neptune Pool at Hearst Castle, William Rowley took the next step and developed an engineering plan to aid in restoring the plumbing system, structure and overall functionality of one of the world's most recognized and celebrated watering holes.

Defining Delicate Tasks

The first of this pair of articles mentioned that Julia Morgan had completed the architecture program at Beaux-Arts in Paris in three years rather than the usual five, but I didn't mention all of the circumstances. One of the rules of that institution prohibited the instruction of students after their thirtieth birthdays, which seems a totally bizarre limitation to us now but apparently made sense to French academicians at the turn of the 20th Century. Given the delays in her gaining a position at the school, she'd entered the program with the clock ticking and really had no choice but to

#30: Tiled Finger Ledge

Safety is never far from my mind as I design for my clients, but as important as it is, it's seldom the only thing on my mind as a project comes together. In fact, balancing the need for features we must include for safety's sake with our everyday passion about never compromising on aesthetics is something I consider with every detail. Whether it's the extent to which