Week 0Decide what the pool is for
Before a spade touches the lawn, one decision sets every other: what the pool is for. Cooling off, real swimming, or a heated soak twelve months a year? Ours is a family pool — an 8 × 4 m rounded rectangle with room to swim and a shallow end to stand in — and its outline is sprayed on the grass.
Words you'll hear this week
- Plunge poolA small, usually uniformly deep pool (up to ~13 m²) built for immersion rather than swimming — cooling off, soaking, cold plunges.Read the full entry →
- Lap poolA long, narrow pool built for exercise swimming — typically 12–25 m long, 2.5–4 m wide, uniformly ~1.35 m deep.Read the full entry →
- Swim spaA compact heated basin (4–6 m) with a powerful counter-current for swimming in place, often doubling as a hot tub.Read the full entry →
Week 1Set out and dig
The digger arrives and the lawn becomes a hole with a slope in it — deeper at one end than the other. That slope is the first design decision you can see: 1.2 m where children will stand, 1.8 m where adults will swim. If the ground is wet, a valve in the floor stops groundwater from floating the finished pool.
Words you'll hear this week
- ExcavationDigging the hole the pool sits in — the shell's shape plus working room around it, and the slope from the shallow end down to the deep end already in the ground.Read the full entry →
- Shallow endThe standing-depth zone of the pool, typically 1.0–1.2 m — where children play, adults wade and steps arrive.Read the full entry →
- Deep endThe deepest zone of the pool, typically 1.8–2.0 m in family pools — deep enough for free swimming and treading water.Read the full entry →
- Hydrostatic valveA one-way valve in the pool floor that lets groundwater into the empty basin instead of letting it lift the shell out of the ground.Read the full entry →
Week 2–3The shell
Steel goes in, concrete is sprayed over it, and the hole becomes a basin. Everything built into the pool is formed now, while the walls are bare: the steps, the tanning ledge, the drain at the deep point and the inlets that will push clean water back. What you decide this week is cast in concrete — literally.
Words you'll hear this week
- Pool shellThe structural basin of the pool — reinforced concrete, sprayed gunite, factory fiberglass or panel construction — that carries water and ground pressure.Read the full entry →
- Gunite / shotcreteConcrete sprayed at high velocity onto a rebar cage, forming a monolithic shell of any shape — the technique behind most custom concrete pools.Read the full entry →
- Fiberglass poolA one-piece factory-molded basin craned into a prepared excavation — the fastest route from order to swimming.Read the full entry →
- Pool linerA waterproof PVC membrane fitted over the pool structure — the budget-friendly waterproofing and finish in one layer.Read the full entry →
- Main drainA suction point at the pool's deepest point that pulls water from the bottom into the filter circuit and makes full draining possible.Read the full entry →
- Anti-vortex coverA domed or channeled drain cover that breaks suction vortices, preventing hair or limbs from being trapped at the main drain.Read the full entry →
- Return inletThe nozzle that pushes filtered water back into the pool, angled to set up a slow rotation that carries debris toward the skimmers.Read the full entry →
- Tanning ledgeA large flat shelf 10–40 cm below the surface — usually 15 cm — sized for in-water loungers, toddlers and lounging.Read the full entry →
- Roman stepsSemicircular steps flowing out of the pool wall in concentric arcs — the classical entry borrowed from Roman baths.Read the full entry →
- Beach entryA gently sloping, zero-depth entry that starts at deck level and descends like a natural shore — no steps at all.Read the full entry →
Week 4The edge
How the pool meets the deck is the most architectural choice of the build. Ours is a skimmer pool: a ring of travertine coping caps the wall, the water will sit a hand's width below it, and two wall skimmers will sip the surface clean. A deck-level pool would instead spill over its rim into a hidden channel.
Words you'll hear this week
- CopingThe ring of finished stone or masonry that caps the pool wall at the waterline — the edge your hand grabs and your eye reads as the pool's outline.Read the full entry →
- FreeboardThe vertical distance between the water surface and the top of the pool edge — typically ~15 cm in skimmer pools, near zero in deck-level overflow pools.Read the full entry →
- SkimmerA wall-mounted unit that draws the top few centimetres of pool water into the filtration circuit, harvesting floating debris, dust and oils before they sink.Read the full entry →
- Deck-level overflowAn edge system where the water stands flush with the surrounding deck and continuously spills into a hidden perimeter channel, from which it is filtered and returned.Read the full entry →
- Infinity edgeA vanishing-edge wall lowered to a precise weir so water sheets over it into a catch basin below, visually merging the pool surface with the landscape behind.Read the full entry →
- Overflow gutterThe perimeter channel of a deck-level pool that catches the continuously overflowing water — finished as a grate or a narrow slot.Read the full entry →
- Balance tankA buffer reservoir that overflow and infinity pools need: it receives the water spilling over the edge and feeds the pump, absorbing the level swings caused by swimmers.Read the full entry →
Week 5The surfaces
Now the basin gets its skin, and the colour of the water gets decided — not by the water, which is nearly clear, but by the finish under it. Ours is white plaster, which reads as bright turquoise once it is wet, with a band of porcelain tile at the waterline where scale and sunscreen collect.
Words you'll hear this week
- Pool plasterA seamless cementitious interior finish (marcite, quartz or polished aggregate) troweled over the shell.Read the full entry →
- Porcelain pool tileFully vitrified ceramic tile with near-zero water absorption — frost-proof, colorfast and chemically inert, the most durable pool interior.Read the full entry →
- Mosaic tileSmall-format tile (2–5 cm) mounted on mesh sheets — the format that wraps curves, radii and Roman steps without cutting.Read the full entry →
- Pool groutThe joint filler between pool tiles — in pools always a water-resistant epoxy or high-grade cementitious grout that survives permanent immersion and chemicals.Read the full entry →
- Waterline tileThe band of tile at the water's surface where scale, sunscreen and grime concentrate — tiled even in otherwise plastered pools because tile scrubs clean.Read the full entry →
Week 6The deck
The pool is only half the picture; the deck is the room it lives in. Pavers go down around the coping, the lounging side gets its two metres, everything drains away from the water, and at one end a pit is formed where the cover's roller will hide.
Words you'll hear this week
- Pool deckThe paved area surrounding the pool — the room the pool lives in. Slip resistance, barefoot-friendly surface temperature and drainage away from the pool are its three duties.Read the full entry →
- PaverA modular deck element — porcelain, concrete or natural stone — laid on a bed or pedestals around the pool.Read the full entry →
- TravertineA porous natural limestone in warm cream-to-walnut tones — the classic Mediterranean coping and deck stone.Read the full entry →
- Cover pitA recess at one end of the pool — under a bench, behind a wall or below the deck — housing the roller of an automatic slatted cover.Read the full entry →
Week 7Water in
Thirty-two hours of garden tap, and the plant room wakes up: pump, filter, heater. From now on the water lives in a loop — out through the skimmers and drain, through the filter, back through the inlets — and keeping it clear is a five-minute weekly ritual, not a chore.
Words you'll hear this week
- Turnover rateThe time the circulation system needs to pass the pool's entire volume through the filter once — typically 4–6 hours for private pools.Read the full entry →
- Sand filterThe classic pool filter: water passes through a bed of sand (or glass media) that traps particles, cleaned by backwashing.Read the full entry →
- Cartridge filterA filter using pleated cartridges instead of sand: finer filtration, no backwash water waste, but cartridges need periodic rinsing and replacement.Read the full entry →
- ChlorineThe standard pool sanitizer: it oxidizes organic matter and keeps bacteria and algae from growing.Read the full entry →
- pHThe acidity measure of pool water; the target band is 7.2–7.4, where sanitizers work best and eyes and skin stay comfortable.Read the full entry →
- Salt water systemAn electrolysis cell that generates chlorine on site from mildly salty water (~0.4% — a tenth of seawater).Read the full entry →
- Shock treatmentA deliberate short-term overdose of sanitizer that oxidizes contaminants after heavy use, storms or the first signs of algae.Read the full entry →
- Pool heat pumpAn air-source machine that moves heat from outdoor air into pool water at 4–6× the efficiency of direct electric heating.Read the full entry →
Week 8Fit-out
The fittings people actually touch. Warm lights in the wall so the pool is still there at nine in the evening, a ladder at the deep end so swimmers get out without crossing the shallow zone, and — if length is short — a current to swim against.
Words you'll hear this week
- Pool lightsSealed LED fixtures set into the pool wall about 50 cm below the waterline, wired through conduits cast into the shell.Read the full entry →
- Pool ladderA stainless-steel entry that takes no swim space: two rails over the coping and rungs down into the water, usually at the deep end.Read the full entry →
- Counter-current unitA powerful jet that produces an adjustable current to swim against — endless swimming in place, even in a 5-metre pool.Read the full entry →
Week 9Cover and care
The last delivery is the one that pays for itself: a cover that goes on every night and halves the heating bill. Then the robot takes over the floor, and the pool asks for twenty minutes a week — until autumn, when it gets tucked in for winter.
Words you'll hear this week
- Solar coverA floating bubble-foil blanket that warms the water a few degrees and, more importantly, stops evaporation — the pool's biggest heat loss.Read the full entry →
- Slatted coverAn automatic cover of rigid PVC or polycarbonate slats that rolls out over the water at the push of a button, from a pit or bench.Read the full entry →
- Pool robotAn autonomous electric cleaner that drives the floor (and walls, on better models), scrubbing and filtering into its own canister.Read the full entry →
- WinterizingPreparing a pool for freezing weather: lowering the water below the skimmers, blowing out pipes, adding winter chemicals and covering.Read the full entry →
Now you can name every part of it. Build your own — it takes minutes.
Looking for one word? The glossary, A to Z →
