ARTICLES Archives - Page 77 of 314

The Unheard Music

The watershape was way off any path I'd ever beaten around New Orleans: It sits north of downtown along the shores of Lake Pontchartrain, and I was genuinely surprised to make its acquaintance. This was back in November 2016, when my wife and I were heading with my brother and his wife to their home in Mississippi after my work at International Pool|Spa|Patio Expo drew to a close. We rolled up West End Boulevard to where it turned into Lakeshore Drive, figuring we'd move along the waterfront until we could conveniently jump over to Interstate 10 and leave the Crescent City behind. But soon after we made the right-hand turn along the water, I spotted a fountain and made us stop: We'd essentially tripped over the Mardi Gras Fountain, which I'd never heard of before, and paused briefly to give it a look. It reminded me immediately of the fountain in the Plaza de España (click here), which I'd seen many times through the years while walking along the Mississippi River toward the convention center. Both installations feature lots of tile plaques, but I found those associated with the Mardi Gras Fountain to be much more interesting because they colorfully memorialize the various carnival krewes that participate in local parades and various other Mardi Gras festivities. I was a big fan of the HBO series Treme and saw a unique part of New Orleans heritage coming to life before my eyes. The fountain itself, however, wasn't all I might have hoped. Yes, the water danced with gusto, with clusters of jets sending water to various heights in a varied array of patterns. But if ever a themed fountain called for music, this one is it: While the jets conjured some of the visual magic of a New Orleans parade, without sound (other than the watery kind) it all fell a bit flat for me. Since returning to California, I've read up on the Mardi Gras Fountain and have come to appreciate its unusual history. First dedicated in 1962, it was designed by Blaine Kern in association with a local architecture firm. Kern was no fountain guy: He was a Mardi Gras float designer who came back from a trip to Europe filled with impressions of great fountains and started a personal crusade to get one built in New Orleans. The original fountain came in with a modest outlay of $42,000, including 70 tiled plaques set like teeth around the basin. The fountain shot water 30 feet into the air, and on warm summer evenings, all lit up, it drew substantial crowds to water shows. But by the 1990s, the watershape had fallen on hard times and was decommissioned. In May 2005, the fountain was treated to a $2.5 million restoration, with new electrical and mechanical systems to go along with new paving and landscaping. Hurricane Katrina massively abused both the fountain and its park just a few months later, and it was 2013 before another hefty infusion of cash brought the space back to life with a new set of upgrades and a bunch of new tile plaques. Knowing what I now know about the fountain and its story, I'm more inclined to be charitable about its musical shortcomings and accept it on its own considerable merits. It has its shortcomings, in other words, but I appreciate it for what it is - a wonderful, personal celebration of New Orleans' Mardi Gras heritage and generations of urban (and urbane) entertainment. Bottom line: The fountain's fine. As for the plaques, they're cool beyond belief. For a video of the fountain after dark, click here.

Recent advances in light-emitting-diode technology have changed the nature of the pool-lighting task, notes Graham Orme. To explore this expanding range of illuminating possibilities, he begins here by defining the dynamics of lighting some familiar contours in all-new ways.

Looking at Lighting

The advent of underwater LED lighting has changed the way we look at and perceive swimming pools and spas once the sun goes down. In contrast to past days, when a single incandescent light blasted the eyes of anyone nearby, lighting is now a far subtler design feature - an intricate, integral part of a pool's aesthetic presence and the key facilitator in creating an ideal backyard ambiance once the sun goes down. But LED technology brings a learning curve with it - one that is even more of a challenge in an era when pool designs are increasingly dynamic and complex. And no matter whether you're a veteran or a

Please Stop By!

I have two main objectives in asking you step on over to the WaterShapes booth during this year's International Pool|Spa|Patio Expo in Orlando: [ ] First, I want to chat with you about WaterShapes.com and get your thoughts on the huge set of changes and upgrades we've recently unveiled. Your feedback is

Transporting us to another time and place, Mike Gannon discusses one of the great artistic and horticultural convergences of all time -- and brings it all up to date by defining the ways he uses that historic collaboration to inspire his designs in the here and now.

Watergardens as Art

It's 1889. You're at the World's Fair in Paris, what the locals call l'Exposition Universelle du 1889, and you've joined them in marking the 100th anniversary of the French Revolution. The world is changing: Paris is at the center of those transitions and you want to see for yourself what's going on. You know that the fair has attracted exhibitors from around the world, but you're drawn to France because

Though his long career, John Cohen has had a knack for finding clients who appreciate his passionate approach to watershaping and, as was true for the project on display here, come to enjoy the unconventional ways in which ideas, themes, echoes and details evolve on site.

Organic Emergence

This project began with a client's dropped jaw. I'd been called to the site by one of my usual subcontractors to help resolve a minor problem he was having. While that was being resolved, I noticed that the new steps in the remodeled pool were far more troubling. With the client and a bunch of other people standing there, I asked for a demo hammer - and saw the looks of astonishment as I smacked the top step and

Genesis Evolution

When I was a student, it generally upset me when a class came nowhere close to completing its agenda. This was especially true in college, but it even reached back into high school, when I'd feel almost cheated that the last five chapters of a 25-chapter textbook fell into some crack at the end of the year, never to be seen or heard from again. I could rationalize it in

Professional Relations

‘When it comes to business,’ observed Stephanie Rose in her October 2002 Natural Companions column in WaterShapes, ‘I know that being a soloist carries me only so far: Rather, it’s the relationships I’ve established and maintained within the business community that have taken me beyond the

Cascades look great in daylight, but lighting them has always been a challenge -- and Jeff Chapman had three of them on his plate. Fortunately, he also had access to a new LED technology -- a system that made his work just as compelling at night as it is by day.

Lights on the Side

We've designed and built lots of fountains and waterfeatures through the years on all sorts of scales and levels, but this one - a definite jump outside the box - will be particularly memorable for all of us. The client was The Woodlands, the big planned community near Houston. One of its highlights is a 1.7-mile-long waterway

Chromatic Virtues

‘Color is amazing.’ That’s how David Tisherman began his September 2002 “Details” column for WaterShapes. ‘It provides us with some of greatest opportunities we ever have to create spaces that are emotionally evocative and visually compelling,’ he added, ‘yet it is also one of the most difficult design details to understand and put to good and effective use. ‘Trouble is, there’s no easy way to simplify the challenge: Color is indeed a tough nut to crack, and that’s as true

Rock-Bottom Value

There was a time when lots of ponds were set up without gravel, notes Ed Beaulieu. But as he discusses here, there are so many advantages to lining their interiors with rocks of various sizes that it's time to push that old practice out of the pond-making picture, once and for all.