We began dreaming with this family about what would be possible if anything was possible. For their project, the ask was to add “one of everything” and more to create a family sanctuary for their backyard. Life is busy, careers are demanding, and at the end of the day creating a space to “be” with family and friends is the perfect way to embrace the peaceful, cozy, tranquil and the Yummy! Al’s imagination has taken it to an entirely new level with this one, adding a fully sea-worthy Chris-Craft boat as one side of the pool, and buildings, docks and streets, to look like the “Streets of Mackinac”, one of the family’s favorite places on the largest project (scale, scope, size and cost) that we’ve tackled to date. We are excited to share more of these adventures with you – in what is going to be one crazy cool pool build!
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Fall 2024 Drone Flyover
This pool is an amazing work of water art by Al Curtis and the team at Legendary Escapes. The customer originally wanted a backyard escape for their family to enjoy and bring everyone home to enjoy. The customer’s enjoy entertaining and have a pretty fun and large extended family, so something for everyone was the over-reaching goal. Once we started talking about themes, and places the family likes to visit, the Streets of Mackinac in Michigan came to mind. From family antique shoppes below the Mackinaw Bridge to the Horse and Buggy Rides on Mackinac Island, this theme brings many things together, family, Michigan, vacations, summer fun, nostalgia and the ability to create fun and quirky themed areas with no shortage of ideas and accoutrements.
Once Al started designing, the homeowner’s decided to let the project take on a life of it’s own. If there was a great idea for a feature, or something that our team just had to have in the project, all we had to do was mention it and it became something incorporated into the pool. Al’s always had the desire to do something special with an actual boat in relation to a pool, so this was the perfect place to add a 1964 Chris Craft Boat as the swim up bar. The boat in the driveway looked larger than life, but once it was placed in the yard and the pool built around it, it looks like it always belonged there, and is at the perfect size/scope for this pool! Most people would think, “A boat in the pool?” think that is crazy, and it would never work. Fortunately Al’s reputation and pool building body of work speak for themselves, and this isn’t such a crazy idea after all.
The pool is large for a residential swimming pool, at just shy of 65,000 gallons when it’s all calculated. The pool has several equipment systems to keep the water flowing and filtering properly. It also has a heater and heat pump to keep it warm in our Michigan weather. The surround of the pool are shoppes, stores, and sights from the imagination that you may expect to see on an up north adventure. Stay tuned to find out how we wrap up this amazing ‘scape in the summer of 2025!
Merlin Safety Cover
We get questions all the time about how we cover the crazy pools we build for the winter weather. It’s pretty simple (now that we’ve done it a few dozen times on complicated and crazy pools.) We measure the pool exactly and tell the cover designer – in this case Merlin – where we want the cutouts/straps and how we’d like to address each feature like the spa, bridge, sunshelf, dock, and waterfall/grotto. The result is a safely covered pool – that looks like an oasis just waiting for some summer fun!
