Triathlete Mary tells us about her Endless Pool and log cabin

“As a GB Age Group Triathlete with limited time to go to the pool due to the ‘day job’, I’d been hatching a plan to get an Endless Swimming Pool Machine at home for months. However, getting my husband used to the idea (he doesn’t like water!) and accepting the sacrifice of my vegetable garden to locate a log cabin next to the house, took a little time to realise.

The requirements for the cabin were quite complex; size-wise it had to fit within the available space and ideally meet the requirements of Permitted Development. From a design perspective I wanted enough height to avoid splashing the ceiling with water; have a separate ‘plant room’ to reduce engine noise and house all the 240v electrics; have an adjacent shower room plumbed ‘through the wall’ to the plant room and, importantly, to locate a standard size Endless Pool in the main cabin without having to cut into the surrounding coping for the bracing walls. And of course, it had to be very well insulated to keep the heat in and to avoid huge electricity bills!

Initially, I’d looked at several ‘off the shelf solutions’ but quickly realised that these were generally of inferior quality and always had design limitations. Not willing to compromise, I searched and found Richard at Keops. He kindly offered a weekend meeting and we were quickly ‘sold’ on Richard’s experience and understanding of what I wanted to do and in the quality of the cabins. Multiple emails later and a lot of patience on Richard’s part with my evolving homemade CAD drawings we had a plan for a Classic style cabin that maximised every inch of available space and met all the design criteria. Additionally, it was only marginally more expensive than the ‘off the shelf’ options which all required expensive adaptation. Factor in superior quality, great service and a completely bespoke solution and it was a very easy decision.

The cabin arrived exactly on time and so did the installation team a week later, taking less than 7 hours to turn a pile of wood into a completed, stunning cabin! Most impressive of all, the cabin had been constructed so accurately that the steel pool frame slotted exactly into the main space – phew!

Three months on, I have a wonderful swimming area admired by all my friends. Despite the bitterly cold weather of recent weeks the temperature inside has stayed very comfortable with minimal heating thanks to the sturdy log construction (no wall insulation thanks to Richard’s good advice), double glazing and ‘comfort level’ roof insulation. And Richard has always been on hand to answer the odd question as we’ve finished everything off.

Now I have absolutely no excuse for slow swimming times in 2011!”