Pools & Spas in Pasadena
Pool and spa design and build for Pasadena's established gardens, historic homes and foothill lots. We have worked in Pasadena for more than two decades, including with the Pasadena Showcase House of Design, and we draw the pool together with the deck, the planting and the trees already on the property.
Pools in Pasadena
A Pasadena pool rarely goes into an empty yard. It goes into a garden with mature trees, older masonry and a house with real architectural presence, and it has to look like it belongs there rather than like new construction set down beside it. What is worth keeping gets settled before a shape is drawn.
The ground varies more than people expect. Lots near the Arroyo Seco and up toward the San Gabriel foothills carry grade changes and runoff from above. The older neighborhoods closer in are flatter, but they come with decades of hardscape and established root systems that a new pool has to be planned around.
Established canopy is often the best thing on a Pasadena lot. We map root zones before the pool is drawn, keep excavation, decking and trenching clear of them where we can, and plan for city review where work comes close to a protected tree.
Spanish, Craftsman and traditional houses each ask for something different. Coping, tile and paving are chosen to sit with the architecture, and the pool is often set on a line with a doorway or a garden axis so it reads as part of the original plan.
Lots near the Arroyo and below the San Gabriels can fall away from the house and collect water from above. Grading, drainage and any retaining are drawn with the pool, so the deck sheds water away from the shell and the house.
Pasadena summers run hot and dry. Shade beside the water, lighter decking and drought-tolerant planting around the pool keep the yard usable in the afternoon without a garden that drinks more than it should.
Nearby communities we serve: Altadena, South Pasadena, San Marino, Arcadia, Sierra Madre
Start here
The style follows how you want to use the yard. Pick the backyard you are actually after and the shape, the spa and the surfaces mostly follow from it. Every project below was built here in Southern California, so the planting, the shade and the surfaces are chosen for this climate.
01 A family-friendly backyard Room to swim, and room around the water. A shallow entry, shade to sit in, and turf that stands up to being used. See complete backyards 
02 A resort-style retreat A raised spa, moving water and planting layered in close. The pool is the centerpiece and the yard is built to match it. See resort-style projects 
03 A pool and entertaining space The pool is half of it. An outdoor kitchen, covered dining and a fire feature keep people outside after the swimming stops. See entertaining spaces 
04 Remodel an existing pool New tile, coping and plaster change the pool. Rebuilding the deck, planting and lighting changes the yard. See pool remodels Pool styles
Modern, Freeform, Formal, Infinity edge, Fiberglass, Pool and spa. Pick one to see who it suits, what it asks of the property, and a project where we built it.
Best for Contemporary and mid-century houses, and anyone who wants the pool to look built rather than dropped in.
On your property Needs a level or terraced area. On a slope the cost is in the retaining that makes the level, not in the pool.
Best for Families, and lots where a rectangle fights the shape of the yard.
On your property Suits a Pasadena garden with mature trees to keep, because the outline can be drawn around the root zones.
Best for Traditional, Spanish and Colonial houses, and gardens that already work on an axis.
On your property Needs space on both sides to stay symmetrical. Tight to one boundary it stops being formal and becomes a lap pool.
Best for Properties with a view or a drop, where the far edge of the pool can be made to disappear.
On your property Needs a drop, so it belongs on the sloping lots near the Arroyo and in the foothills rather than the flatter lots closer in.
Best for Smaller yards, tighter budgets, and jobs where a shorter build matters more than a custom shape.
On your property Works on a Pasadena lot with clear side or rear access. Older lots with narrow side yards and low canopy often leave the shell no route to the hole.
Best for Anyone who wants the yard usable in January, not just August.
On your property A raised spa has to be structured with the pool, not added later. Heating is where most of the running cost goes.
One coordinated team
Everything marked here is in this one photograph, and the same company drew and built all of it. So are the cabana, outdoor kitchen and fire table just outside the frame. A pool builder gives you a pool. This is the rest of it.
How a pool gets built
The five stages below are the pool version of the same five-step design process we run on every project.
Before: the yard as we found it Somebody comes out and measures. Grade, boundaries, setbacks, trees worth keeping, and where the panel, meters, valves and drains actually sit. On a pool that survey decides where the excavation can go before anything gets drawn.
Base plan The pool, the deck around it and the planting get drawn together, same scale, same sheet. This is where the yard either works as one space or it does not.
Materials Coping, waterline tile, interior finish, decking and equipment all get picked against samples. Structural work like retaining and sections through a slope gets engineered at this stage, not discovered later.
3D rendering Permits go through our own permitting department. Then excavation, steel, plumbing, shotcrete, decking and finish, with a supervisor on site and a different trained crew for each trade.
Finished Planting, lighting and equipment start-up, then a walkthrough on how the system runs and what it needs. Plants get a monitoring period after that.
Featured project
A terraced Pasadena backyard gained a tanning-ledge pool and raised spa, a lawn fire-pit lounge, a built-in outdoor kitchen and multi-level composite decking linked by paver steps, finished with drought-tolerant planting along the retaining walls. More pairs like this are in our before-and-after archive.
The backyard was mostly open lawn, dirt and concrete around a small existing deck off the back door, with a plain concrete driveway run down the side of the house. At just over 10,000 square feet the lot had room to work with, but nothing built into it yet to actually live in.
The plan set a pool and raised spa into a new Trex composite deck reached by paver steps with a cable-rail gate, added a built-in prefab barbecue island, and used the existing rear hedge as the privacy screen rather than replacing it, backed by a new horizontal-slat redwood fence topper only where it needed height by the neighboring garage. A decomposed-granite gathering loop with a prefab fire pit gives the far end of the yard its own destination, framed by raised stucco planter walls and layered succulent and grass planting.
Before your consultation
You do not need answers to these before you call. Knowing what the questions are makes the first conversation a lot more useful.
The yard decides more of this than taste does. Setbacks, equipment access, the fall across the site and how much room you want left around the water all narrow it before style comes into it.
Concrete is formed on site in shotcrete, so the shape is yours and the build takes longer. Fiberglass comes as a molded shell in a fixed size. Quicker, but it has to physically reach the hole.
Raised, flush or spilling. Sharing equipment with the pool costs less to build and less to run than a separate hot tub, but the structure has to be drawn in from the start.
The two details you look at most and touch most. They decide whether the pool looks modern or traditional more than the outline does.
A baja shelf is somewhere to sit in a few inches of water. Benches and wide steps add usable space without adding depth.
Heating decides whether the spa gets used in January. Saltwater runs a chlorine generator instead of buying chlorine, and it can go on any of these pool types.
Lights in the water, and lights on everything around it. Running the conduit with the rest of the work is the only way to get fixtures where you want them.
Barrier and drain requirements are set by code, and Pasadena projects run through the City of Pasadena rather than the county. Work near a protected tree can need its own review, and on a property in a landmark or historic district the walls, gates and anything visible from the street can too. We pull the permits in house, and what the city asks for shapes the drawings, not the other way around.
Investment & schedule
A pool is shaped by the property it goes into: the design, the access, the engineering and how much of the yard around it is in scope. We settle those during design, so you are deciding with the site in front of you rather than a guess.
No quote written off a photograph can account for what your property is like.
Decking, drainage, utilities, planting, shade, lighting and where people actually sit all bear on where the pool goes and how it gets built. Settling them on one set of drawings is what keeps conduit out of the wrong trench and stops paving being cut to fit afterwards.
Access, engineering, permits, finishes and scope vary a lot from one property to the next, so the investment and the schedule for a pool are set once we have seen the site and the design is settled.
Tell us about the property and what you want the yard to do. We will walk through the design, site and permitting factors likely to shape it.
What homeowners say
They completely remodeled our pool, added a hot tub, and handled all the lighting and landscaping. Our project supervisor, Juan, demonstrated great communication and meticulous attention to detail, taking extra care to ensure that every aspect was safe for our kids and our puppy. This is clearly a company that takes genuine pride in their work.
We are thrilled with our new backyard. Our pool, spa, and firepit feel like a resort, and the work was professional, clean, on time, and priced well. The entire POL team made the construction process easy and manageable, keeping us informed every step of the way. We couldn't have asked for a better experience.
They did a great job with our pool deck and pool remodel. Everything was planned in detail before even beginning, and proceeded exactly as expected. Samantha was a great designer to work with, and Scott made sure all needs were met during construction. The company as a whole is just extremely professional and dependable.
We had our entire backyard remodeled by Pacific Outdoor Living last year, and we couldn’t be happier with the results. As a mom of two little boys, I wanted a space that was both beautiful and functional for our family, and that’s exactly what we got. We removed everything, including the old pool, and built a brand-new pool, artificial grass, fire pit area, and a basketball court for my husband.
Pacific Outdoor Living did an incredible job transforming both our front and back yards. They turned our rarely used backyard into a stunning and functional space, incorporating a new pool, pavers, and artificial turf. We met with at least four other pool builders, but POL stood out for their ability to handle every aspect of the project seamlessly, from design to construction to landscaping.
Our backyard transformation into a tiki oasis by Pacific Outdoor Living was nothing short of extraordinary! Julian Montford's design expertise and Trent Morrill's impeccable coordination made this project an absolute pleasure from start to finish. The 500 square foot pavilion and tiki hut added an enchanting touch, while the refurbished built-in pool became the centerpiece of our newfound paradise.
We had our backyard remodeled, which included pool installation, pergola build, and driveway paving. Our designer Julian was able to create the backyard that we envisioned and our project manager Trent made sure the whole process was smooth & efficient. They finished the project within budget and even ahead of schedule.
Questions
Usually, if the trees set the layout. We map the root zones and canopy during the site analysis, keep the shell, decking and trenching outside them where we can, and keep new irrigation off the trunks. Where work has to come close to a protected tree, we plan for the city's review during design rather than discovering it at excavation.
Not if it is designed for the house. We treat the architecture as the brief: coping, tile and paving chosen to match it, the pool set on a line with a doorway, a window or a garden axis, and planting that ties the water back into the garden. If the property sits in a landmark or historic district, we check what the city reviews before the design is final.
Often, yes. Plenty of older pools have a sound shell under tired plaster, tile and coping. We assess the shell, the equipment and the deck and tell you plainly whether resurfacing, reshaping or a full rebuild is the right call. On one Pasadena estate we kept the existing pool and rebuilt the yard around it, with a shaded pergola, a larger outdoor kitchen, a putting green and a fire-pit lounge.
The design stage generally runs two to five weeks depending on the size of the project and how many revisions it goes through. Construction varies with scope: small jobs can be a week, and large projects can run three to six months. Your designer and job supervisor give you a firmer timeline once the design is complete.
Yes. Pool remodeling is one of the services we offer, and several of the projects in our portfolio kept the existing pool shell and rebuilt it with new tile, coping and plaster along with the deck and planting around it.
Yes, and it is the reason the company is set up the way it is. We design and build the pool, hardscape, carpentry, planting and lighting with our own crews, so the same team is responsible for how those pieces meet.
Yes. Concrete pools are formed on site in shotcrete, which lets the shape be drawn to the yard. Fiberglass pools arrive as a molded shell in a fixed size and shape, which shortens the wet trades but depends on the shell being able to reach the excavation.
Yes. The design fee covers site measurements, an illustrated design, a 3-D design and revisions as needed, so you see the layout and the materials before anything is built.
A complete outdoor living environment involves more than individual features, so pool and outdoor kitchen cost depends on how the whole yard comes together. On the pool, the price moves with size and depth, how much grading or retaining the site needs, the coping, tile, interior finish and decking, and whether there is a spa, heating, water features or automation. On the kitchen, it moves with counter length, appliances, and the gas and electrical runs. We design the pool, kitchen, patios, lighting, and landscaping as one cohesive space, so every element complements the others and you have a clear understanding of the overall investment before construction begins.
Look at completed projects, not just conceptual designs, and look for ones like yours: a similar architectural style, a similar lot, the same features. Our portfolio covers a broad range of outdoor environments, from hillside pools and full backyard remodels to courtyards, outdoor kitchens, and drought-tolerant gardens. Evaluate the finished work and the details that bring a design to life.
Not all estimates represent the same scope or level of craftsmanship. Compare materials, construction methods, specifications, allowances, and overall project completeness, not just the final price. A low number built on vague allowances tends to come back later as change orders. Estimates priced from a measured, detailed design are the easiest to compare line for line.
Yes. A new pool or spa needs a building permit, and the gas, electrical, and any retaining walls around it can need approvals of their own. Requirements vary by city, so our in-house permitting department maps them during design and typically pulls every permit the job needs. You do not have to take time off work to queue or work out the requirements yourself.
Yes. Pasadena is within our Greater Los Angeles service area, and we have worked here for more than two decades, including with the Pasadena Showcase House of Design. Use the address checker on our Pasadena page to confirm coverage for your exact property.
Tell us how you want the backyard to look and work. We will walk you through the right pool design, the scope and what happens next.
What happens next: we set up a visit, measure the property and talk through what you want the yard to do. Then you get a design to look at before you commit to anything.
