WaterShapes World Blog
Just a month ago, I wrote in this space about the generosity of a group of watershapers and landscape designers who planted a park in a Rochester, N.Y., neighborhood that definitely needed a boost. Ever since, it seems, I have kept running into reports of genuine, aquatically related community spirit. In many cases, for example, threatened closures of public swimming pools have been averted through donations by individuals and businesses in their communities. Local governments, strapped for the cash to pay for anything other than essential services, have seemed all too willing to save money by closing down pools (or shutting off fountains or idling interactive waterfeatures), thereby making
When I was new to the watershaping world back in the 1980s, it always surprised and disappointed me when newspaper articles – most of them quoting real estate agents and officials as primary sources – told the world that a swimming pool added nothing to the value of a home. In fact, the articles contended, a pool probably lessened the home’s resale price by severely limiting the
Bruce Zaretsky’s name certainly should be familiar to longtime readers of WaterShapes and WaterShapes EXTRA!, but if he and his partner Sharon Coates keep it up, their renown is likely to spread far beyond the watershaping industry in months and years to come. The other day, Bruce and Sharon sent
As I indicated earlier this year, we at WaterShapes have dedicated ourselves to making our newsletter and Web site bigger, better and more helpful than ever. We’ve increased the volume and frequency of original newsletter articles and features, gotten involved in raising the level of education in our industry and organized everything we do to make solid information accessible in ways that
I’m still smiling. As I’ve declared in a few recent blogs, my hope has been that the apparent conflict between Genesis 3 and Artistic Resources & Training (ART) would result in two high-caliber education providers emerging in place of one that was drifting. If the first classes conducted by ART are any indication
I don’t think I could be more pleased. After I wrote about the emergence of Artistic Resources & Training (ART) a few weeks back, I reported on a number of conversations I’d had with people who said I’d been unfair to Genesis 3 and had
I spend a good bit of time almost every day wandering around the Internet, exploring and evaluating information and selecting the choicest morsels to share on the homepage of the WaterShapes Web site. In the past several weeks, I’ve spotted a whole range of stories about problems related to public-sector watershapes. On the one hand are tales of drought conditions causing various municipalities to
My recent blog on the formation of Artistic Resources & Training brought an unusual response: Not a single person wanted to comment on my words in print, and the many who called me directly all requested that our conversation be off the record. While that hasn’t advanced the dialogue I was hoping to build, it amply demonstrates that feelings are running high – which is, I suppose, understandable given the
Through the past several weeks, I’ve been caught up in a whirlwind of conversations about ART – Artistic Resources & Training. It’s the new educational forum being built by Mark Holden and a collection of like-minded professionals (including David Tisherman, Kevin Fleming, Judith Corona and Larry Drasin, among many others) who want to kick the level of instruction and information now available to watershapers and environmental artists up to
I don’t remember exactly when or where I saw my first tanning shelf, but I recall being puzzled and even a bit put off by the concept. I have never been one to loll around my own backyard pool, basically because my fair skin takes a UV beating. (Actually, I’m just tired of having my dermatologist remind me that I’m paying the piper for
