I have some friends who have lawn up to 2 sides of their pool.

They love the blend with the yard and it does look very nice, but they must schedule the pool service back to back with the lawn crew. It is incredible the amount of lawn clippings that apparently make their way into the pool and subsequently their cartridge filters. They have also had issue after heavy rain and had muddy areas near the pool. It is nothing a little sod won't fix, but its more than I would put up with.

They do not use their pool that much however, so the point is probably moot.

Love that look! That's precisely what we did, only we used travertine coping and slabs of sandstone set in sod. I will eventually replace sandstone with travertine or travertine pavers. We did a double-wide coping, so coping in 24 inches.

Grass clippings do get in the pool. We have the infloor cleaners that clean it all up pretty quickly. Before the sod grew in, the area did get pretty muddy, but now it's not a big problem.

With a fairly small lot, I did not want the hard look of a concrete jungle. The green grass bordering the white travertine with the blue water is a lovely look. And our dog needed some grass, too.

Ah, my favorite. Scott's Turf Builder in the pool. Which will be greener? The only way to get the nitrogen out is repeated dilution when this happens. The landscapers don't know any better or care. Your chlorine demand go way, way up. Chem costs go up. Cleaning costs go up.

Pretty, yes, for a spell. Forward thinking? Not in my book.

Scott

That's what we have - this is a pool from the 60's, the previous owners took out all the decking, reno'd the pool and put in flagstone. The flagstone is a PITA with chairs, but I love the look so we added more. It's a little better if you get some polymeric sand in the joints - it tends to stick around longer.

Pool guy hates this - we get all kinds of algae blooms and we get tons of debris in the pool - the crepe myrtles drop right in there. But I look out the kitchen window and this is what I see...and to me, that's worth it:

Our previous owners planted crepe myrtles along the back fence and they drop in the pool too -- to the point that I put pantyhose over my skimmer baskets to keep the seeds from getting through. LOL They are the only screening between us and the house behind us and they are pretty -- but when they go, they will not be replaced with crepe myrtles. WHich brings up another question -- can you kill a crepe myrtle? I'm not sure they ever do die -- just multiply in the most inconvenient places.

As to the original question, I love that look (not even the flagstone like the photo above) and it would work very well with the small and formal design of our pool. I suggested it, but DH rejected it and the pool folks agree for the reasons above -- grass clippings, dirt and the wrong chemicals getting in the pool. I think that, if you really want that look, you need to either do you own pool work and lawn care and know that you have to be very careful (you could always mow with a grass catcher or blowing away from the pool) or be prepared to pay for extra care -- one way or another.

We also realized we would not have a place for our table and chairs where they wouldn't sink into the dirt. We don't have that much decking as it is, so it stays.

It can be nice to look at but there are definitely increased maintainence requirements.

Great look! My design has grass on two edges of the pool. We will be using synthetic grass though. Anyone know of any problems with this?

We have grass going to the coping on the backside of the pool. It is very sloped away from the pool so no debris from rain but cutting the grass is a bit of a hassle. I fired the lawn guy and do it myself with a reel mower and I hand trim around the coping. I still get a lot of grass in the pool but I skim it out by hand as soon as it hits the water.

Thanks everyone. The pool will have an auto cover and is only used on weekends, so the lawncare should not be much of an issue. Nevertheless, the points here are good ones. We have decided to go with a slight variation -- we are doing 2x2 bluestone slabs with 6" spacing, but we will be using a perennial ground cover (not my area, but I think some sort of creeping thyme is proposed) that does not need regular maintenance.

I will let you know how it works out.

nyc sport - I'm interested in learning more about your build! We are in the midst of planning a build, and on our must-haves is an auto cover. I mentioned in another post that the price is astronomical ($23,000) - do you mind if I ask what you are paying for yours (you can send me an email if you prefer - just let me know). Can you give me more information on your build? For instance, size of pool, etc. I am also considering grass to coping because I think you can do it with an auto cover and it is such a pretty look. Do you have a thread going?
Thanks and sorry for all of the questions!

Not sure where you are located, but we have a wild strawberry here -- I think it may be an Indian strawberry, that spreads like a low ground cover, has pretty white blooms and little red berries. They are tiny berries, so not considered edible by humans, but I think some of the birds enjoy them. We have patches near a couple of our beds where the grass is thin, but I have thought that would be fun to let grow as an intentional ground cover. It seems to hold up to foot traffic, and I think I saw it at a plant sale or nursery somewhere. Creeping thyme would be nice and fragrant, but thought I'd throw the berry idea out there in case you might like something less expected.