Pools to Dive Into

Dunlop demonstrates the deck’s secondary use: as a launching pad into the concrete plunge pool on the first floor.

Midwest: Hoerr Schaudt Knitting the designed spaces into the greater wilderness beyond was paramount for the ten-acre landscape Douglas Hoerr devised in northern Michigan. “The idea is once you’re there, you can’t tell what we did,” he says. Instead of building formal gardens right to the property line, Hoerr added a meadow planted with mature trees and indigenous grasses to buffer the yard. Naturalistic plantings ebb and flow around the 110-foot-long saltwater lap pool.

The Babat residence in Nashville is blessed with a big backyard; however, the blistering Tennessee sun once made it feel more like a broiler than a place to kick back and relax. Enter architect Michael Goorevich, who devised a wood-and-steel trellis to cover part of the space.

Devised as a compact but extremely flexible all-in-one addition, Cocoon9’s prefab cabin illustrates how to make the most out of very little square footage. The international firm specializes in prefab design and construction. Every model incorporates elements that open up and fold away to increase flexibility and functionality. The models are not only beautiful—they’re also environmentally friendly, employing sustainable materials like FSC certified bamboo, cerused oak and low-e insulated glass with thermally broken aluminum frames to minimize the need for artificial heating and cooling.

House 43 is both monumental and inviting. The woodsy retreat feels removed from the beach, yet is located just three miles inland. The Hariris’ design is both spare and luxurious—a rectilinear L-shaped plan set around a sculptural patio and pool of travertine. Clad in huge glass curtain walls and bleached red cedar, the house’s warm gray hue gently offsets the reds, browns, and occasional lichen greens of the damp surrounding scrub.

This 3,200-square-foot structure was assembled with a prefabricated foundation, concrete panel siding, and efficient built-ins, minimizing construction debris and toxins—such as concrete foundation tar—on the site.

A study in contrasts with the stolid stucco main house, this 750-square-foot pool house seems to float lackadaisically on the bluestone terrace. “The pool house speaks of summer,” says designer E. B. Min.

Inspired by their clients’ bold art collection, a pair of architects designed a mix influenced Hamptons vacation house that subverts tradition.

As the facade of a Bates Masi-designed home in Water Mill, New York, rises from eight to 14 feet high, the mahogany planks subtly widen. “It was quite a demand to make of the contractor,” architect Paul Masi says. “But the design was so much about traveling through the site and weaving [the house] together with the deck.”

Bernard Trainor collaborated with architect Peter Bohlin for a pool design in the Santa Lucia Preserve. Photo by: Jason Liske. Published in the April 2013 issue of Dwell.

Landscape designer Vickie Cardaro used native grasses and plantings near the swimming pool (opposite). Cushions upholstered in Sunbrella fabric rest atop a Trex deck. The western red cedar ceiling extends through the deep eaves and covered seating area.

Architect Sean Lockyer designed a 5,760-square-foot concrete, stucco, and ipe home for a couple and their three children in the Southern California desert town of Indian Wells. The residents selected the home’s furnishings, including the Royal Botania chaise lounges. A covered patio, with a fire pit and bar, sits next to a 60-foot swimming pool.

After months spent researching solutions to make her home’s fabric roof functional, Lisa Sette can finally relax.

This rooftop courtyard of a Mexico City home is lined with a verdant mix of indigenous plants, including banana trees, palm trees, lion’s claw, Mexican breadfruit, and native vines.

Colored concrete walls, pivoting glass doors, and a scissor-shaped steel roof maintain the fun and modern feel of this computer-game designer’s suburban poolside shelter. Project: Traeger Pool House Architect: Dan Phipps Architects Location: Woodside, California

The deck connects to the open kitchen and living room through Loewen sliding glass doors. Photo by Patrick Bernard.

Inside the cedar-framed pool house are a 40-foot-long lap pool and a hot tub. Should that feel too limiting or too tame, the Atlantic Ocean is only a short 200-yard stroll away.

Architects Leslie and Julie Dowling, twin sisters and Michael Graves protégées, created this 1,000-square-foot, single-story home by linking two flat-roofed pavilions together in the shape of a T. The design of this Sonoma County home was inspired by Philip Johnson’s 1949 Glass House in New Canaan, Connecticut.

Competitive swimmer Sydne Didier commissioned Austin Design Inc. to create a 102-foot-long pool house in a freestanding structure behind her Amherst, Massachusetts, house. Read the full article here.