A Pop-Up Swimming Pool In France

This picture was shot a couple of years ago, during a holiday at the French west coast close to the old pirate town of Saint Malo (which currently is a tourist town). It shows a temporary swimming pool, to use when the tide is low.

When the tide is high, six hours later, you won’t find a swimming pool at all at this location. The water gets completely refreshed then, super naturally. This means no chlorine and no unhygienic plasters between your toes or, even worse, in your mouth. As a consequence of the very heavy Breton tide, sea swimmers have to walk hundreds of meters during low tides, through muddy soil before reaching the sea.

The creation of this close-to-the-city swimming accommodation is a perfect functional concept for flexible use of space. It’s a great piece of both landscape and experiential design as well, which has brought together the dynamics of nature with human needs. I’m impressed by the straight and almost modernist forms within the context of natural and organic principles.

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