The Swimming Pool: Stylish and Inspirational Ideas for Building and Decorating Your Pool

An enlightened approach to pool design, The Swimming Pool matches superb aesthetics with the best of today’s most innovative building materials for the ultimate guide to building your backyard retreat. Renowned landscape designer Martha Baker explores four popular styles—Romantic, Modern, Classic, and Rustic—and details the key elements that help to create a complete look. She provides ideas for personalizing elements to match your individual taste and accommodating practical needs. Leading you on a guided tour of exclusive international locales featuring pools with many different looks and styles, she offers a wealth of advice on:

•Identifying the right design style to complement your property

•Siting your pool and selecting the best pool shape

•Creating poolside cooking and dining areas

•Choosing furniture that epitomizes the art of relaxation

•Landscaping to integrate your pool with your home and property

•Pinpointing the best accessories to pull it all together

Reminding us that pool design should be infused with a blend of fantasy and reality, Martha Baker features a seductively elegant romantic pool that conjures the image of a Spanish courtyard; an infinity pool that takes its cue from island traditions, perched on a hillside overlooking a tropical harbor; and a highly sophisticated modern pool topped with playful, oversized sculptures. Authoritative and packed with more than 250 gorgeous photographs, The Swimming Pool opens up a world of unprecedented pool design.

Martha Baker, a certified landscape designer, is the author of Garden Ornaments and The Outdoor Living Room. Her gardens have been included in the Parrish Art Museum tours and the Horticultural Alliance tours in the Hamptons, and featured in magazines such as Martha Stewart Living, House Beautiful, and Elle Décor. Her work in fashion and design has appeared in New York magazine, the New York Times Magazine, and House Beautiful. She has four children and lives in New York City and Shelter Island, New York.