34 
House & Garden 
THE GARDEN SWIMMING POOL 
Apart From Jts Obvious Uses It Can Be Made a Decorative 
Asset in the Garden Landscape Scheme 
CHARLES ALMA BYERS 
T HE size and location of one's 
grounds permitting, the swimming 
pool constitutes a most delightful 
garden asset, with both esthetic and utili¬ 
tarian value. It is, indeed, doubtful if 
any other garden feature affords greater 
possibilities decoratively and is, at the 
same time, capable of furnishing more 
appreciable enjoyment. And, incidentally, 
it is gratifying to note that its various 
admirable points are steadily winning 
wider recognition—that the private swim¬ 
ming pool is becoming quite popular. 
Naturally, it is as a utilitarian asset 
of the home that the garden swimming 
pool is particularly to be appreciated. 
Making it not only possible but invitingly 
convenient for one, on a summer morning, 
to walk directly forth from sleeping room 
into garden and there to take a plunge 
in the pure, crystal-like water of one’s own 
swimming pool, the feature gives a rare, 
genuine delight, indeed. This experience 
that it makes a pleasure is, moreover, 
beneficial to one’s health, for a plunge 
into the pool’s cool depths always refreshes 
and invigorates and thus the better fits 
The swimming pool on the estate of 
George Pratt at Glen Cove, L. I., is 
set in a clearing of the trees. At one 
end the path leads through a gate, 
across a stretch of lawn and up through 
the shadows of a forest alley 
one for the day. In short, such a feature 
is everlastingly and conveniently a source 
of both healthfulness and enjoyment, and 
one that invites participation in its benefits 
by every member of the family. 
In respect to the decorative possibilities 
of such a pool, water alone, whether it 
flows in a stream or reposes in a limpid 
Ixtdy, always adds charm to a garden. 
And the swimming pool, with its gleam¬ 
ing surface mirroring its environment of 
flowers and trees or something architec¬ 
tural, to say nothing of the beauty of its 
sheen alone, becomes a most delightfully 
enhancing garden asset. It also affords 
an engaging excuse as a center for various 
attractive schemes of gardening. It may 
be concealed from view by a screen of 
trees, shrubbery and flowers, with perhaps 
paved or graveled paths winding among 
them; or, also as a means of secluding it, 
it may be surrounded, either wholly or in 
part, by something in the nature of a 
pergola, rustic or formal, with its columns 
and overhead framework possibly support¬ 
ing a profusion or a mere tracery of vines. 
The possibilities it affords in a decorative 
A formal bathing pavilion creates a 
background for the pool. The low 
enclosing wall is surmounted by a per¬ 
gola. Entrance is gained through the 
wooden gate. The whole is painted 
white. Delano & Aldrich, architects 
M. E. Hewitt 
