Building the infinity pool

Though the pool design and free standing Maxi rib with negative edge was the work of Compass Pools Melbourne – these clients artistic flare and finishing off, the pavers and rock was what made this area so spectacular. They managed, with the colour and paving to have it sit gently in its landscape and not be contrasting.

The Quartz pool colour

The colour of the water is affected by the colours of the sky so some days it is brighter and lighter and some days darker. They have their living area and pool area flow through, so it is all on one level.

The clients had a self-cleaning pool before and this was their second one.

Negative edge serving as a barrier

The Vogue was a Maxi Rib free-standing pool that had a purpose-built edge made during the manufacturing of the pool shell – a small drop which then allowed us to build an overflow edge into a catchment tank below. This edge was the required 1.2m in height which means the pool wall acted as the pool barrier or pool fence. By not having to see the fence this negative edge enhanced the view even more.

Choosing the right pool colour

They wanted the colour of the pool to be in complete contrast with the green view of the Gippsland hills and wanted the colour to make a splash. They loved that the pool was always blue and felt it was a very inviting colour to swim. ‘Pool water should be a definite blue’ and sapphire blue created different versions of blue water depending on the sun and clouds.

Lap pool

They never knew how many people could be swimming at one time – hence they needed a long pool for lap swimming – but it had to be versatile for ‘classic catches’ and ‘Marco Polo’ games as well. A lap pool for all ages – teenagers to adults. The family lap pool.

Colour

The colours of the house contributed to the colour scheme of the pool and the paving to keep the simple clean looks of natural tones of the pool. The Quartz colour pool and spa gives a soft blue so that it doesn’t sit too harshly against the view. The softer blue sits gently with the view.

Infinity edge pool

To maximise the use of the sloping site, we went for an infinity edge style swimming pool where one of the edges merges with the environment. We used a Maxi Rib X-Trainer swimming pool and also an X-Trainer spa (not visible on the images).

Degree of difficulty

To keep the pool and spa at house level – our client wanted to enjoy the view with the pool and hence we had to build a suspended slab. The slab had custom positioned holes for the infloor cleaning heads.

The negative edge required the manufacture of the swimming pool shell to have a ‘drop edge’ custom built into the pool along 2 sides. The overflow of water disappeared into a stainless trough that was caught in 2 x large tanks under the suspended slab.

Pool look & design

The client wanted the pool and spa to look minimalist and anted clean lines. To have 3 separate functioning features of the water – the spa / the pool / the wader but to make sure the water zone did not look ‘too busy’.  They had owned an old concrete swimming pool previously and had struggled to manage the scum line so that was an important issue for them with the negative edge.

They loved the look of fully tiled pools but didn’t want to have to manage that surface so they chose the Pearl to give the similar look. The build cost was also much less given the slab was designed for a lighter pool structure than concrete.

Pool and spa combo with a wader

The client had small grandchildren and wanted the spa and the wader for them.