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Crawford Italia — competition & gala pool, in Bedfordview, after completion
Competition and gala pools for schools

25-metre school pools, built for gala day.

It takes about a minute, and there's no obligation.

We build competition pools for schools in gunite and marbelite, with the starting blocks, lane tiling and deck a gala needs, and we do it while the school carries on around us. You’ll find twelve of them on this site, from Ladysmith to Lonehill.
The pool in the photograph is Crawford Italia’s in Bedfordview. It’s 25 metres by 20, and it took us three months from the first day of excavation to the first length.
Rather talk it through first? Give us a call or send a WhatsApp.

Most schools ask us for the same pool: 25 metres long, wide enough for a gala and shallow enough for lessons.

A school pool has to get through galas, swimming lessons and thirty summers. Most of ours are 25 metres long, 1.2 metres deep through the middle and 1.5 at the ends. Some we build from scratch. Others replace an old brick pool that has become too short and too narrow for what the school needs now.
What we build

The school pool work we take on

01

New 25-metre pools

We spray the gunite shell to the architect’s specification and carry on from there with one team, right through to the starting blocks and lane tiling. Crawford Italia and Trinity House Glenvista are 25 metres by 20, and Hamiltons College is 25 by 12, indoors. Three months is typical.
02

Rebuilds

When the old pool can’t be kept, it comes out completely and a new gunite pool goes in where it stood. That’s what happened at Curro St Dominic’s in Newcastle, where one painted lane-end cross was cut out for the school to keep.
03

Renovations

New marbelite, new racing lanes and mosaics. At Crawford Prep Lonehill and Crawford Pretoria the school crest is set into the middle of the pool, and at Crawford La Lucia we brought back a 50-metre Olympic pool.
04

Finishing a contractor’s shell

At Curro Edenvale the main contractor cast the concrete shell and we took it from there, with the waterproofing, mosaics, racing lanes, Interbau tile coping and a commercial filtration system.

Planning a pool for your school?

Tell us what it needs to do and who’ll be swimming in it. We’ll come out to site, have a proper look, and draw it up for you.
Pinnacle College Raslouw — completed
On difficult ground

Dolomite, tight campuses and contractors on site.

Pinnacle College Raslouw and Trinity House Heritage Hill both stand on dolomite. Before anything else went in, we cast beams under the shell with agricultural drains beneath them, working alongside the main contractor who was building the new school.
At Trinity House Little Falls we set a 25-metre by 25 pool into a banked amphitheatre. Every school site is different, but the profile the school swims in stays the same.
For architects, QSs and developers
What clients say
“Russ Curtis and his team are the most professional pool builders I’ve ever met. Their workmanship and quality is outstanding and I would highly recommend Curtis Pools to anyone.”
Doug R. · Google review

Questions people ask

How long does a school competition pool take to build?

Usually three to four months, depending on whether a main contractor is building around us, and there usually is one. Crawford Italia’s 25-metre pool took three months from the first day of excavation to the first length.

What size is a school competition pool?

Most of ours are 25 metres long. The width depends on how many lanes the school wants: Hamiltons College is 12 metres wide, Crawford Italia and Trinity House Glenvista are 20, and Randpark High and Trinity House Little Falls are 25. The depth is usually 1.5 metres at the ends and 1.2 through the middle, so the pool works for lessons as well as galas.

Can you keep our old pool?

Sometimes we can. If the shell is sound, we can re-marbelite it and give it new lanes and mosaics, as we did at Crawford Prep Lonehill. A brick pool that’s the wrong size, like the old one at Curro St Dominic’s, has to be broken out and replaced.

How do we go about getting a quote?

Fill in the short form at the top of this page, or phone us on +27 11 794 4735. Because every pool is shaped to its own site, we’d rather come and look at the space and give you a proper figure than quote a number over the phone.

Hamiltons College, Ladysmith — competition & gala pool, in Ladysmith, after completion
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Tell us about the pool your school has in mind.

Whether you’re after a price, some advice, or a bit of both, it starts with a quick note to us. It takes about a minute.
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