Making the ordinary extraordinary: a designer transforms a simple patio pillar into a work of aquatic art - Design Corner

Pool & Spa News, Feb 28, 2003 by Michael Nantz

Sometimes the most ordinary component of an aquascape can become an extraordinary waterfeature.

That's what happened on this local project I designed two years ago, when we learned the clients wanted a covered patio. I decided to make the pool an integral part of the covering and vice versa, with a corner support post in the pool.

What precipitated this idea was the fact that they wanted to put a covering over the patio. The column serves mainly as a support mechanism for the overhead structure. I advised the clients that tucking the pool into the L shape of the house would retain a large portion of the backyard for their pets and children. So the pillar's placement in the pool just made sense.

Normally, I don't like to put obstructions such as bar stools into my pools because they collect dirt and debris. But in this case, we put a thermal ledge there, so the depth is only 6 inches. And there's plenty of space to sweep around it.

The only question was how to make the pillar waterfeature come to life.

I decided to cover the post with a stacked Oklahoma flagstone, using a chinking method that hides the mortar. I don't like to see mortar with stacked stone--it looks unnatural, and the protruding mortar would create additional splatter problems when water spilled over the stone.

On this project, we started with a 10-inch-deep piece of stone at the base. As we moved up the column, we reduced the depth of the stones. We put the mud about two-thirds of the way back on each stone. When the mortar was pressed in, it came forward, but not enough to come into the field of view. So you never see any mortar on the front 2 inches of stone.

The design is almost contradictory: The look of flagstone is about texture and shadow, but we had to worry about splashout. At the tightest spot, the coping is only 24 inches away from the column base. So too much texture would make the water bounce out onto the patio. That's an important consideration because if you're sitting in a chair on the patio you don't want to get wet.

Where you typically find problems is in the joinery of the stone, where one stone meets another. If the joints aren't tight enough, the water can collect and form little streams in the gaps. I instructed the mason to keep the mud back and make the vertical joints very tight. That typically allows for a cleaner flow.

We also needed to keep the stone itself as smooth across the face as possible. If you unintentionally chip the face, you're going to get a stream.

Then there was the issue of moving a steady and equal sheet of water over the pillar. We decided to loop a piece of 1/2-inch schedule 80 PVC plumbing around the post, about 8 inches down from the top. We then created a perforated line consisting of 2-inch slits spaced about 1/2 inch apart along the outside, where the water would come out. If we'd just cut one solid slit around the pipe, the heat of the cut could have made the opening collapse on itself.

To avoid any splashing, we stuck with a very low flow rate--just enough to wet the column and emit the sound of a light rain. We also had to fine-tune the water flow. We had anticipated that, so we set the plumbing up with a valve for flow adjustment.

Once the water was on, the stone facing needed a different kind of fine-tuning. There were a couple places where water would collect in a joint and form puddles, causing excessive splash. So we had to go back and tweak it, chipping out a little stone in one area, packing in an extra piece somewhere else. But we knew from previous jobs that would happen.

That's just you what you expect when you digress from the ordinary.

Michael Nantz

A pool designer since 1987, Michael Nantz opened Lewisville, Texas-based Elite Concepts in 1991. He has received several NSPI design awards, and is an associate member of Genesis 3.