When Shannon and Merl Kardokus moved into their Brent Gibson Classic Home Design English Tudor-style custom home seven years ago, they dreamed of adding an outdoor oasis that included a pool and a custom pool house. The couple wanted to wait until their three sons, Cooper, Creed and Carson, were a little older, but when they were ready to add the pool, they wanted the new addition to flow seamlessly into the existing home design.
“When we decided to do the pool, we really wanted to add the pool house and attach it to the home. We wanted it to look like it was not an add-on but have it flow into the existing house,” Shannon says. “We had an outdoor kitchen, and we wanted it to be the transition area. This is where we did all the cooking and entertaining.”
The Kardokuses once again called upon Brent Gibson and Robert Powell with Pool Envy to make their vision into a reality.
“They wanted a destination place for the kids. The pool house has a theater, a small kitchen, a bathroom and a game room,” Robert says. “The other big thing they wanted was if you were inside the pool house, you could look out these big double doors right into the pool. That way, she could have her eyes on the kids from every standpoint inside.”
The 2,300-square-foot pool house incorporated the same Tudor design elements like soaring wooden beams and custom brick in order to match the existing home. The outdoor kitchen was transformed into a transitional area between the house and the new pool house. All the flooring in the new addition was tile wood floor for easy cleanup, and the bathroom includes a shower for post-pool washing. Inside the pool house, the kids could indulge in a game of ping pong or shoot light hoops, watch TV and sports and cook their own snacks.
“So we approached it as though we were doing a whole new construction,” Brent says. “The pool house is a place for their three boys to entertain and have their friends over. They also have a lot of social activities for their family and church.”
The pool itself is a dream come true for Shannon.
“I always wanted a pool. I didn’t have a pool growing up, but it was my dream to have a pool in our backyard,” she says.
The contemporary-style 40,000-gallon ozone-osmosis pool includes an elevated spa with a gas fire pit, fountains that pour into the main area and a sit-in area covered by pool umbrellas.
“The ledges with the umbrellas let you sit in the water for hours and hours and hours. We could finally invite people and feel like we had a place to entertain, which was nice,” Shannon says. “It is just kind of a retreat back here. We eat dinner out here. The boys like to swim in the evening. They spend a lot of time over the past year in the pool house too playing ping pong or watching sports on all the channels.”
Even the pergola that originally covered the outdoor kitchen was repurposed as a staging area for the 16-by-80-foot batting cage Robert built for Cooper and Creed in the backyard.
“Brent and Robert really knocked it out of the park,” Shannon says. “The pool house and pool match the existing home just perfectly. You would never know it was an add-on, and it turned out exactly how I hoped.”
Another addition to the backyard area was a batting cage for their sons. Robert Powell of Pool Envy designed the 16-by-80-foot-deep batting cage with a stone base and netting to keep balls from going wild. The pergola, which covered the outdoor kitchen, was repurposed as a staging area.
