Over the Fourth of July weekend, Michael Voloshin swam three times with his children. That's three times more than he swam all last summer, even though his family belonged to a swim club.
"That was the main reason we got the pool," said his wife, Denise. "I said: 'Think how nice it would be when you get home from work, to grab the newspaper and relax by the pool.' I knew he would slide in for a few minutes and play with the kids."
Even if Mr. Voloshin doesn't get in the water, he can't help but relax by his new 391/2-foot-long fiberglass pool. Maybe it's the sight of yellow and pink daylilies clustered in curves along the textured concrete deck. Maybe it's the scent of English lavender blooming by the poolhouse. Or maybe it's the sound of water cascading down a rugged sandstone waterfall and into the deep end.
When you don't even have to get wet to cool off at the pool, Melissa Blackwood knows she has done her job well.
"The nicest compliment we ever got was when someone said, 'You can't just look at one of their gardens. You have to experience it,' " said Ms. Blackwood, a designer who works with her father, Pete Blackwood, in the landscape design firm Blackwood & Associates Inc.
Others can experience the team's work tomorrow when the Voloshins' pool and garden in Unity, Westmoreland County, are among 18 stops on the Botanic Garden of Western Pennsylvania's annual Open Gardens Day. Gardens in Fox Chapel, Greensburg and Ligonier will be featured on the self-guided tour.
The Blackwoods had hoped to have the Voloshins' poolscape done in time for the tour, but rainy weather has set them back. Alpine Pools hurried to have the pool ready for the holiday weekend. Now that it is, the Voloshin children -- Andrew, 13; Rachel, 9; and Matthew, 6 -- don't want to get out.
"They ask every day: 'Can we swim?' " their mother said. "Even when it's raining."
Since this is the family's first pool, they're still learning about water chemistry, salinity and maintenance. Safety is covered by a locking, retractable automatic pool cover, and an aluminum fence will add to it. Also yet to be installed are a gas grill, bathroom, changing area and kitchen in the poolhouse and a firepit and patio behind it.
On Thursday, the Blackwood crew was still planting 'Annabelle' hydrangeas and setting up seating areas by the pool. Ms. Blackwood, who studied horticulture at Community College of Allegheny County and interior design at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh, joined her father's landscape company in 1996. Mr. Blackwood, who has an associate's degree in turfgrass management from Penn State, started working in Beaver County and Sewickley in 1972.
These days, the firm does about half of its business in the North Hills, much of it new construction. Mrs. Voloshin admired their work at another house in the development and asked them to redesign the landscaping in front of her house last year. Last summer, crews began to clear the pool site by cutting down some large trees and brush "up to my chest," Mrs. Voloshin said. The pool's fiberglass shell was delivered in February, and pool, landscape and other contractors worked around each other. Other key contractors included S&K Concrete, Gabriel Mayhew of Mayhew Landscape Group, Ghrist Electric and Wade Heating & Cooling.
Mr. Blackwood's design, which can be seen at post-gazette.com, has two large areas of textured, dyed concrete -- one on three sides of the pool and the other in front of the poolhouse. A concrete path and set of sandstone steps link the driveway and the two concrete decks, one of which contains a large planting island. For visual continuity, the same brick was used for the house and poolhouse and red and gray fieldstone found on site was used to build columns and the waterfall. Sandstone boulders that match the steps jut from the waterfall and planted hillsides around the pool.
The three main garden beds are filled with low-maintenance shrubs and perennials, including abelia, spirea, hosta, sedum, inkberry, ornamental grasses, Siberian cypress and astilbe. Trees include serviceberry, redbud, sweetbay magnolia, hemlock, whitespire birch and dogwood.
Bobbing above the rocks in the waterfall are the dainty pink and white flowers known as whirling butterflies (Guara). They're part of Mrs. Voloshin's favorite view from her new pool:
"Sitting at the top of the pool, you can see across the waterfall to the mountains. It's just a very peaceful view," she said.
Tickets are $40 each for tomorrow's Open Gardens Day tour sponsored by the Botanic Garden of Western Pennsylvania. To reserve tickets, call 412-444-4464. Blackwood & Associates can be reached at 724-873-1384.
First Published: July 12, 2008, 8:00 a.m.