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.

Fill was removed using wheel barrows due to poor access. Pool is finished with glass mosaic waterline tiles, natural stone paving and a hardwood timber deck.

The Vogue swimming pool has been installed to take advantage of the design of the home allowing for the indoor-outdoor feel and flow from living to entertaining. The pool is finished with a silver travertine natural stone paver both on the waterline and around the pool surround.

The hardwood timber deck features LED lights installed flush for an added wow factor.

Renovating a dog training centre

The Seeing Eye Dog Association SEDA was doing a renovation of their premises in Kensington. This is the centre that they train & house dogs for the visually impaired. They were expanding the number of dogs that could be housed and trained. They were upgrading the kennels (and increasing the number of kennels), building a wash bay and swimming pool.

Automatic cleaning system

We were lucky enough to work with the design team from the start to build a self-cleaning pool with a slight alteration….we had to build a ramp for the dogs to walk in and out of the pool. The Nexus technology with Compass Pools Australia was allowing us to customise these standard shape shells (we had them build the shell with a ‘cut out’ following a 1-100 slope or fall with a flat area). SEDA were able to get the huge benefit of an easy to maintain fibreglass swimming pool but with the benefit of customising to suit their unique needs – a feature that was traditionally only available in concrete pool design.

The dogs shed a lot of hair so even our Vantage self-cleaning system was able to cope with this heavy load. It was built with a salt chlorinator and the heating was a combination of solar heating with a heat pump. They needed to maintain 26 degrees all year round.

Working with the commercial contractor

During the build, we had to work with the commercial contractor who was building the kennels/wash bay and new training grounds and the swimming pool was only one part of the large project. The trickier part of the build was during the design phase – the ramp design (the fall and length) was based on the trainers practical understanding of how they work with the dogs and what they felt was needed – there was no ‘rule book’ to follow. They knew the dogs the best so we wanted to deliver the ramp suitable and easy for them to use whilst training.

We also had the pool raised higher and had to build up around the pool as they wanted to be able to have the pool sitting higher.