Swimming Pool Liner Makeover Reveal
Just in time for the hot Southern summer sunshine, the pool liner makeover is done!!!
We might have already had three pool parties to celebrate. 😉 (Not even exaggerating.)
UPDATE: See the final pool reveal here!
Remember that whole backyard tour from a few weeks ago when the pool situation was a tad bleak?
It looks a million times better now!
When we first moved into this house, maintaining a swimming pool was a very foreign idea to us.
Neither Robert nor I had grown up with pools in our backyards before, and even though a pool wasn’t even on our wish list during the house hunting process, it was definitely a huge perk for us when we found our 1960 colonial.
The scary part was the unknown cost of upkeep, and since then, we’ve discovered what an (almost literal) money pit a pool can be.
So when we found out the existing 10+ year old pool liner was on its last legs, we went to researching all of the different ways we could update it without going totally broke while still making it look beautiful and modern.
The Before
And then I found this TrueStone Collection at GLI Pool Products that looks so much more high end than basic vinyl liners and would allow us to customize our pool while keeping the price at a reasonable amount.
We are SO happy with how it turned out!
We considered several of their different designs, but the Obsidian liner was the one Robert and I fell head over heels for.
It’s hard to tell in photos, but under water, the liner has a shimmer effect that makes it look like real mosaic tile.
You can see more of their pool liner designs here.
Pool Draining
We have a pool guy who regularly maintains our pool once a week because it’s still such a learning process for us, and it’s so much cheaper for him to handle the job with his tools and wholesale cost on supplies. We skipped our usual DIY spirit on this one.
So this was the pool once it was all drained.
Yeah, that old liner was totally done.
DIY Painted Coping Strip
GLI Pool Products told us that to keep the cost even lower and use what we already had, we could just paint the coping strip to blend in with the new liner.
We’re always game for a DIY project anyway, so we took one of the dark gray eyeball fittings to Sherwin Williams to get color matched for a gallon of flat exterior paint.
Robert spent a day brushing it on as the water drained before the next liner installation step.
Installation
If you’re a local to the Charlotte/York County area, we love Edwin’s Pool Service (you can find local pool contractors for your area here). They handled the entire job within a matter of a week.
Look how pretty!!!
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With Edwin’s permission, Olivia did cartwheels in her pajamas in the shallow end because this little mermaid was READY!
Fittings
We used ColorMagic fixtures for the eyeball fittings, skimmer, and drain covers too so that the entire pool would look custom blended.
During the process, we were able to install a second drain so that the pool would be up to code too.
It is such a relief to finally have this big job completed so that we can enjoy it for the rest of the season.
Can you believe this before and after?!!!
This was our view when we first toured the house.
And here we are after just over two years later and a lot of hard work.
Robert got a drone at Christmas, so he had way too much fun photographing the progress of this entire project. 😉
We still have a few more outdoor projects for this backyard in the next couple of months like patching and painting the concrete with a non-skid surface, giving a facelift to the exterior of our pool shed, building a fire pit from leftover bricks we found, and installing an outdoor fireplace on our back porch in the fall.
Challenge accepted!
With the girls’ birthdays coming up in September/October, we’re hoping we can squeeze in one last pool party before the season is over (perks of living in South Carolina).
Once fall hits and it’s time to close it up, we’ll have a safety cover to protect the girls in the off-season as well.
This is certainly not the last you’ll see of this backyard since we have even more planned ahead for years in the future with a fence update, a full concrete resurfacing, and landscaping changes, but this was a big first step for us.
We’re so excited about this huge transformation, but more than anything, we’re so thankful for this fun-filled outdoor space for its provision of fellowship with family and friends.
There’s nothing better than splashing around with friends and seeing our kids all grow up together away from screens and enjoying being in the sunshine and fresh air.
We feel so blessed to live closeby to lots of family, and this backyard has given us so many great memories with them already that we can’t wait for even more memorable holidays, weekends, and lazy summer days to come.
Do y’all have anymore big backyard plans you’re tackling soon? We’re only just getting started over here.
