Designing a Swimming Pool with Glass Mosaic Tile

Incorporating glass mosaics design into your swimming pool
can be just the thing to make your pool come to life, it
will keep your pool from being ordinary and suffering from
the ho hum's.

Colored cementacious finish coatings that are pretty
typical today. After some years they start to wear and
fade. With solid colored glass tile you will never have to
have your pool walls recoated again. This can save quite a
bit of money in the long run.

Glass tile is forever, it will never change its look or
loose it's vibrant color due to the wear of chlorine and
sun. Maintenance is a snap as the glass tile is non-pourus
and cannot be penetrated by staining from unwanted objects
that can wind up in the pool such as leaves.

There are so many colors, sizes and styles available it is
sometimes difficult to choose. Some have a reflective
quality. They are manufactured using a mirror backing with
a transparent colored glass overlay. While some glass
mosaics are opaque and others semitransparent. They all
have unique qualities that work for many different looks
and effects.

There are even photo luminescent tiles that absorb ambient
light during the day and then at night they give off that
stored up light. Glass mosaics are fantastic for your
waterline as opposed to the everyday tiles offered from
most pool companies. Some pool tile suppliers have special
software that allows you to design your own blend or design
of pool tile mosaics.

One feature that colorful mosaics are great for in modern
swimming pool design is the vanishing edge. This is usually
one side of the pool that has no coping; instead the top of
the swimming pool wall is flat and lower than the
surrounding coping. The water flows over the top of the
wall and down into a reservoir and is recirculated back
into the pool, it looks as though the water just vanishes
over the edge.

The beach is a really cool feature; there is no step down
into the pool. It is just like walking out of the ocean or
a pond. The pool bottom is constructed so that it gradually
tapers up to the level of the pool deck . This can be
wonderful for children and older folks. For wheel chair
bound swimmers, the beach can be used as a ramp for the
wheel chair as there is no step to contend with.

Sometimes the entire pool is clad with the glass mosaic and
the glass color gradates from a blue or green into a
gradation of dark to light beige as it meets the pool deck

My favorite pool enhancement is a swim up island bar. You
can sit around it sipping your favorite beverage and chat
with your friends and family while being submerged in the
refreshing cool water.

The colorful mosaics also can help to avoid accidents from
people jumping into the pool and hitting a step or swim out
that cannot be seen because the step or swim out is the
same color as the rest of the pool interior. This can be a
spine-jarring hazard if you jump in and don't see the
underwater object lurking below. The answer for this is
to have your pool contractor install a row or two of the
brightly colored tile along the outer edge and in the
center of the underwater hazard. So when you are
considering the different options in front of you when you
are installing a new pool or remodeling your existing pool,
remember the many benefits that glass mosaic tile can
provide..

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Anthony J. Ventura is a tile and marble contractor with 25
years of experience in custom home construction, design
consultation, and swimming pool design. If you have any
questions or need advice see us at
http://www.pooltileworld.com