Professional Watershaping
'Through the years,' wrote Brian Van Bower at the head of his Aqua Culture column in the October 2005 issue of WaterShapes, 'more than a few watershaping professionals have asked me how to break through and start working with high-end clients. 'I respond by giving them the disappointing news that there is no magic key here: Serving the high end takes
'Few things are as important to the aesthetic impression made by swimming pools, spas and other watershapes as the colors you select to use in and around them,' wrote David Tisherman in opening his Details column in the September 2005 issue of WaterShapes. 'Take tile as an example. Whether it's just a waterline detail, a complete interior finish or some elaborate mosaic pattern, it serves to draw the eye into a design. If the color and material selections work, the scene can become
For many years, Bruce Zaretsky faced the annual need to generate enough income to keep his business and his staff going through New York's long, cold winters. Here's a look at few of the most successful sidelines he found in his quest to keep the seasonal wolves at bay. As you read this, some of us in upstate New York are already thinking about
'The way I see it,' wrote Brian Van Bower to start his Aqua Culture column in August 2000, 'we watershapers can look at ourselves in one of two ways: as diggers of holes in the ground that hold water, or as artists working with one of the most exciting mediums on the planet. For a lot of reasons, I like the second of those options, because the first is passive - the sole goal being to contain the water - while the second gets me more
Back in 2001, I took a job working for a high-volume pool-construction firm as one of its 30 salespeople. For the first four years or so, I did all of my design work by hand. Quantity was always king in that operation, so I never even left the office: Someone would hand me a set of plans and I'd start working, despite the fact I'd never walked the site, seen its surroundings or had any
'Everywhere you turn these days,' wrote David Tisherman to start his Details column in August 2005, 'you see watershapers tackling projects that would have been unthinkable even a few years ago.' 'With this broadening list of possibilities, however, . . . [t]he industry's like a teenager with a fresh driver's license: just because he or she knows how doesn't necessarily mean that
'If you ask my employees,' wrote Bruce Zaretsky in starting his July 2010 On the Level column, 'they'll tell you that I'm an unrelenting pain in the neck - a real tyrant. That's because I'm always asking nagging sorts of questions such as, "Why isn't this project finished yet?" or "How much longer is this going to take?" or "Can you speed things up?" 'My questions, of course, are somewhat unfair. . . . But I have no reluctance to come across as a tyrant
I started out on the construction side of the pool industry nearly 20 years ago. Back then, I probably experienced the building process a good 500 times, picking up insights into what determined the level of success of each project. As time passed, I found myself being drawn to the design side: I saw it as a way to put all of those insights to good use; more important, I knew it was where I could do the most good for homeowners. In making the transition, I
'Every single project I design and build,' wrote David Tisherman near the top of his Details column in July 2005, 'is fully, individually engineered, and I refuse to make any assumptions on my own about what might be needed in a set of plans to create a sound structure. If any builder anywhere thinks that he or she knows enough to get by without support from a structural engineer, well, that's just asking for trouble.' 'I know what I don't know, frankly, and I sleep well at night knowing that
'I've expended lots of ink,' wrote Bruce Zaretsky in opening his On the Level column in WaterShapes' June 2010 edition, 'extolling the virtues of good water management. . . . And this all makes sense, given both the needs of our society and the fact that we who read and write for WaterShapes all derive some portion of our livings from the work we
