Tonight, an installation about + POOL at Ace Hotel Gallery, at 20 West 29th Street, in Midtown, Manhattan will open to the public. The free exhibition, “Doing Something Big When No One Asks You To Do Something Big,” chronicles the four years worth of research and development that went into planning the world’s first filtering, floating pool. Running from Feb. 5 to March 1, the installation will be open 24 hours a day, seven days a week at the Ace Hotel Gallery. Tonight’s opening reception, from 7–9 p.m., will feature the founders and board members of the large-scale civic project. The installation features floor to ceiling wall drawings by the designers, visualizing the project’s process from an idea to a pool, while sharing interesting discoveries and anecdotes.
The idea was conceived during the summer of 2010 when designers and founders Dong-Ping Wong, Archie Coates, and Jeff Franklin, of design firms Family and PlayLab, respectively, aimed to revitalize New Yorkers’ perception of the East River. An environmental casualty from pollution, their solution for the body of water between Brooklyn and Manhattan was to build the world’s first water-filtering, floating pool so that it would be cleaner, and urbanites could enjoy swimming in it.
The initiative for the backers is to buy a singular pool tile, totaling 70,000, emblazoned with their name or group, to cover the deck, walls, and floor. If all of them are claimed, the $15 million construction budget for the 9,300-square-foot, cross-shaped structure can be realized. To date, the project has raised almost $500,000 primarily through Kickstarter, in addition to a successfully tested filtration concept in the Hudson River, which will be built into the pool’s walls.
