From romantic figures to obscene silhouettes, L.A. backyard are full of surprises
A century ago, movie stars Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks amazed America by rowing a canoe across their cement pond in Beverly Hills. By the 1950s, lavish swimming pools of the stars captured the popular imagination, and unusual shapes appeared with help from new construction technology. The ability to spray concrete onto a form, rather than trowel it by hand, transformed the pool industry.
Jayne Mansfield loved showing off her heart-shaped pool in Holmby Hills and Liberace playfully tapped the keys at the edge of his piano-shaped plunge in Sherman Oaks for photographers. Libby’s watering hole is still there, as is a similar one Frank Sinatra built in Palm Springs.
Midcentury pools shaped like a harp built for a musician in the hills of Burbank and one resembling an ice cream cone in Encino for Baskin- Robbins co-founder Irv Robbins still welcome swimmers. Historian Charles Jencks wrote about the architectural oddities of the Golden State in the 1980s while enjoying a California-shaped pond behind his Rustic Canyon home and out in Sun Valley, the Pink Motel sports a pool shaped like a fish.
“I’ve been in the industry for over 50 years. We did a pool shaped like a Datsun with a spa in the wheels and a pool for two gay guys shaped like a penis,” says aquatic consultant Brian Van Bower. “Not so much anymore. Overflows and reflective surfaces have taken precedent over weird shapes.” Van Bower says oversized lakes are replacing naturalistic ones. “There was a time I loved lagoons but that was two wives ago.”
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