A contemporary natural pool, for a sloping walled garden to make the most of the magnificent views onto the welsh valley below.

This stunning natural pool sits at the top of a sloping walled garden, retaining a sunny terrace and linking with the sloping garden and valley below. A pool house opening onto the terrace with a quirky barrel sauna extends the swimming season and provides a sheltered spot to enjoy the water even on a windy day. The views across the water are spectacular.

This is a special project we were delighted to work on. We were asked to design a contemporary natural pool for a walled garden to work with the sloping garden below and provide a retreat for our clients and their guests to swim and enjoy relaxing beside the water.

We designed the pool with a 10m long swimming zone for lengths, with an L shaped shallow end to one side where stone steps lead into the water from the terrace.

The pool has a long plant filter, where reeds and marginals are planted, which is the first glimpse you have of the water when entering the walled garden. the regeneration zones border a larch sun deck, which provides an attractive seating place adjacent to the water. A long jetty from leads out from the deck doubling as a diving platform.

The pool has stone coping on the internal walls and bespoke stone York stone coping on the external walls, which are faced with walling stone to clad the liner.

Our clients especially wanted to hear the sound of running water, so we used an existing slate water trough and working with a local stone mason who constructed a bespoke slate tank which we lined with a stainless steel inner to create a water cascade as return form one of the surface skimmers.

Our pool electrician installed the pool lighting, uplighting the moving water and installing pool lights in the swim zone.

As we planted up the pool we were at eye level with red kites riding the thermals. Rooks called out from the wood behind and as we finished we sat and watched a spectacular sunset across the water as the sun dipped behind the valley below.

The pool is 44m long in total, it fits beautifully with the terrace and valley below and has attracted a wealth of wildlife to the walled garden. Our clients enjoy swimming all year round and it is a joy to return and service this pool each year and see how well looked and used it is.