Designing an outdoor entertainment area around a Melbourne pool
A custom concrete pool is rarely the brief on its own. For most premium Melbourne homes, the pool is one element in a wider outdoor room that has to handle a Friday night dinner for ten, a Sunday morning swim, a Christmas Day with three generations and the way the back of the home looks from the kitchen for the other 360 days of the year.
The entertainment area is what holds the project together. When the pool, the surrounds, the alfresco and the planting are designed as a single architectural decision, the result reads as part of the home. When they are bolted on afterwards, the pool sits in a backyard rather than in a considered outdoor room.
This guide is the considered version of how to design the area around the pool. It covers zoning, materials, sight lines, lighting, planting and the details that hold the composition together.
The quick answer
Plan the entertainment area at the same time as the pool, not after. Define the zones, set the sight lines from inside the home, pick a material palette that runs from inside to outside and design the lighting at structural stage rather than at completion. Treat the pool, the paving, the alfresco and the planting as a single architectural composition.
Start with the brief, not the pool
The most common mistake on a premium outdoor project is starting with the pool. The pool is the most visible element but it should not be the first decision.
The first decisions are the brief and the sight lines. Who uses the space, when and what does the home look like from the place where the family gathers. The answers shape where the pool sits, how big it is, where the alfresco goes and what the room feels like from the kitchen window.
Work the brief through these questions before any drawings are committed:
- How many people will the space hold on the busiest day of the year
- Which rooms inside the home look directly onto the outdoor area
- What does the family do outside in summer, autumn and winter
- Where does the morning light fall and where does the afternoon shade sit
- What is the privacy constraint to neighbouring blocks
- What is the wind direction in summer
- Is the space for casual daily use, weekend entertaining, or both
The brief should produce a written list of zones before any architecture is drawn. The pool is one of those zones.
Define the zones
A working outdoor entertainment area typically holds four to six zones. Each zone has a different function and a different rhythm of use.
The common zones are:
- The pool itself, with a clear edge and a defined shape
- A poolside lounging zone with sun loungers or built in bench seating
- An alfresco dining zone with table seating for eight to twelve
- A covered or partly covered outdoor kitchen or barbecue zone
- A lawn or planted zone for children, pets or open green space
- A quiet seating or fire pit zone for the end of the evening
For each zone, decide the floor material, the shade, the lighting and the relationship to the pool. Some zones will sit directly on the pool edge. Others will be set back to give the pool a clear visual frame.
A well zoned outdoor area lets a family of four use it on a Tuesday evening and feel like the room is the right size, and host twenty people on a Saturday and have the room still hold together. Poorly zoned areas read as either empty or crowded depending on the day.
Set the sight lines from inside the home
In a premium Melbourne home, the kitchen and living spaces are often the most used rooms. The outdoor area is seen from inside the home far more often than it is seen from anywhere else.
Design the pool location and the entertainment zones so that the view from the kitchen, the dining room and the living room reads as a composition. The pool should be in frame rather than off to one side. The alfresco should not block the view to the pool. The planting should not interrupt the line of sight from the busiest internal seat.
This is the moment to test the design in elevation rather than only in plan. A pool that looks well placed on a flat plan can disappear behind the alfresco roof line in three dimensions.
For homes with a clear architectural language, the line of sight from inside to outside is part of the building. Treat it as a designed view, not a coincidence.
Choose a material palette that runs inside to out
Material continuity is the single largest contributor to an outdoor entertainment area feeling like part of the home. When the paving, the coping, the alfresco floor and the internal floor share a material family, the room reads as one space.
A considered palette typically holds:
- One primary stone used for paving
- One complementary stone or tile used inside the home that visually relates
- One timber or warm material for vertical surfaces or built joinery
- One waterline finish that picks up a tone in the palette
- One soft material for built seating, cushions or shade
Avoid mixing too many materials. Three to four primary finishes is usually enough for a residential project. A palette that introduces a new material in every zone reads as busy rather than considered.
The waterline tile or finish of the pool deserves particular attention. From the kitchen window, the pool finish is one of the most visible elements in the outdoor room. The tone should be selected to relate to the paving, the home and the planting, not chosen in isolation.
Plan the lighting at structural stage
Lighting is the most under-planned element of premium outdoor projects. The right lighting plan is decided during the structural stage of the build, when conduits, fittings and switching can be set in place. The wrong approach is to add lighting at the end.
A well lit outdoor entertainment area uses four to six light layers:
- In-pool lights, positioned to wash light through the water rather than create hot spots
- Coping lights or step lights along the pool edge for safety and definition
- Path or zone lights set into paving or low planting
- Feature lights on the home itself, washing walls or highlighting architectural detail
- Tree or planting uplights for depth and ambience
- Task lighting at the outdoor kitchen or dining area
All lighting should be dimmable and zoned. The same outdoor room needs a different lighting state for a children's birthday at six in the evening and an adult dinner at ten.
Warm colour temperature, in the 2700 to 3000 kelvin range, suits residential outdoor lighting and reads as architectural rather than commercial.
Use planting to soften and frame the pool
The planting around the pool does three jobs at once. It softens the hard edges of the architecture. It creates privacy from neighbouring blocks. It frames the view to and from the pool.
For Melbourne conditions, the planting palette typically draws from a mix of structured evergreen forms for the bones of the garden, soft grasses or perennials for texture and seasonal interest and one or two specimen trees for shade and vertical scale.
Common considerations:
- Avoid deciduous trees too close to the pool unless the family is prepared for autumn leaf load
- Use clipped hedging to define zones without blocking sight lines
- Consider the long term canopy of any specimen tree, not its size at planting
- Select species that suit Melbourne climate variability and the specific microclimate of the block
- Coordinate planting with the pool design, not as an afterthought after handover
A landscape designer working alongside the pool builder during the design phase produces a more integrated result than either party can deliver alone.
Get the alfresco and shade right
The alfresco is the part of the outdoor area that gets used most often outside swimming season. Get it right and the family uses the space year round. Get it wrong and the alfresco becomes a storage area for outdoor furniture.
Considerations for a premium alfresco:
- Orient it so that summer afternoon sun is shaded and winter morning sun is welcomed
- Set the ceiling height to relate to the home, not to a standard pergola dimension
- Specify the floor material so it relates to the internal floor and the pool coping
- Plan for heating in cooler months, whether built-in or carefully selected freestanding
- Plan for ceiling fans in summer for evening dining comfort
- Size the alfresco to hold a dining table for the largest regular gathering, with a metre of clear circulation around it
If the alfresco is built as part of the home rather than as a separate structure added to the back, the result reads as integrated rather than appended. See our recent projects for examples of integrated alfresco design.
Site the outdoor kitchen or barbecue with intent
The outdoor kitchen has shifted from a niche to a standard inclusion on premium projects. The design considerations have shifted with it.
A well sited outdoor kitchen:
- Sits within easy reach of the indoor kitchen for plate and glassware transfer
- Has a clear bench surface for prep, plating and serving
- Includes a sink with hot and cold water
- Has built in storage for outdoor cookware and serving items
- Is positioned so smoke from the cooking surface clears the alfresco rather than drifting into it
- Has its own task lighting and access to power
The cooking equipment itself, whether a built in barbecue, a wood fired oven, a teppanyaki plate or a combination, should be selected to match the way the family actually entertains rather than to a generic outdoor kitchen brief.
A note on Melbourne
A few specifics worth designing around for Melbourne homes.
Summer sun and afternoon heat ask for considered shade. Winter mornings and evening cool ask for protection from wind. The same outdoor area needs to work across a wide temperature band.
Council overlays in some inner suburbs constrain pool fencing, paving levels and structures over a certain height. A design that ignores the overlay at sketch stage gets reworked at permit stage.
Bushfire considerations apply for some homes on the Mornington Peninsula and the urban fringe. Material selection, planting and structural choices should account for the BAL rating where relevant.
Privacy from neighbouring two storey homes is a common constraint in bayside homes in Melbourne and suburbs like Toorak and Hawthorn. Pergolas, screens, hedging and the orientation of seating can all be designed to address this without making the space feel enclosed.
The honest summary
A custom concrete pool sits at the centre of a wider outdoor room. The design decisions that protect the result happen across the whole composition rather than only at the pool edge.
Zone the space before drawing it. Set the sight lines from inside the home. Pick a material palette that runs inside to out. Plan the lighting at structural stage. Coordinate the planting with the pool design. Get the alfresco and outdoor kitchen right at brief stage rather than at completion.
When the pool, the surrounds, the alfresco and the planting are considered as one architectural decision, the entertainment area reads as part of the home. That is the result the brief should set out to achieve.
Frequently asked questions
Should the pool and the landscaping be designed by the same team?
Not necessarily the same team, but the pool builder and the landscape designer should be coordinating from brief stage. A pool design committed in isolation rarely integrates well with planting and surrounds added later. The most considered results come from a pool builder, landscape designer and where relevant an architect working through the brief together.
Can you build a pool and entertainment area on a sloping block?
Yes. Sloping blocks in suburbs like Hawthorn, Kew and Mount Eliza are common ground for premium pool projects. The pool and surrounds need to be engineered for the slope, with structural retaining, level changes and considered terracing designed in from the start. Sloping sites often produce more interesting outdoor compositions than flat ones.
How long does it take to design a pool and entertainment area together?
A coordinated design phase for a custom pool and integrated outdoor entertainment area typically runs six to twelve weeks, depending on complexity and how many consultants are involved. The longer design window produces a tighter build phase and a more resolved result.