koi pond design

A client's request for a turf edge to go along with his perimeter-overflow pool confronted Brian Van Bower with an unusual challenge -- and led to a solution that serves as the crowning touch for a project filled with watershapes from one side of the property to the other.

Edged in Green

Of all the design trends that have taken hold in watershaping through the past ten years, the one that leads us to work with plenty of slot-edge, perimeter-overflow systems may well be my favorite. I've done them partway and all the way around pools and spas; I've run them up against all sorts of materials, from poured concrete to incredibly beautiful varieties of stone; and, most of all, I've appreciated the skill that goes into installing them and making these water-in-transit

Once the site of an abandoned sewage plant, Jambalaya Park in Gonzalez, La., stands as testimony to just how ambitious a renovation project can be – and of how tangled the path to success sometimes becomes. As watershaper and watergarden specialist Les Ewen reports, the first attempt at installing the park’s fountain and Koi pond ended in a shambles, at which point he and his staff stepped in to put the city’s plans for the park back on track.

A Recipe for Jambalaya

Truly a large-scale project full of unique technical challenges in an unusual and important civic setting, the renovation of the watershapes at Jambalaya Park in Gonzalez, La., is easily the most unusual project our firm has ever tackled. The park covers seven beautifully wooded acres in an older section of town that's mostly residential but sits directly behind City Hall and several other smaller civic buildings. It takes its name from the fact that the city is known as the world's "Jambalaya Capital" and annually hosts a week-long festival celebrating the Cajun stew that has become a star in the