Landscaping and swimming pool contractor in Abu Dhabi: designed, previewed, built.

Two grounds, two specifications

The island communities sit on reclaimed sand and sabkha. A pool there is designed against uplift from the water table and dewatered while it is built; planting beds usually need their soil replaced and treated before anything goes in; and every fixing near the coast is stainless, because mild steel does not last in the salt air. None of that is an upgrade on an island plot. It is the baseline, and it is priced as its own line so you can see it.

Mainland plots are the opposite problem. The ground is inland sand and gatch with a low water table, the plots are the largest we work on, and the summer heat decides what survives. There the money goes into shade structures that make the garden usable from May to October, an irrigation design sized to what the plot can actually hold, and privacy planting along long boundaries.

Approvals: the community first, then the municipality

On Yas Acres, the Aldar community NOC comes first and the Abu Dhabi Municipality building permit follows for the pool. On Jubail Island, the community’s design review stamps the drawings before the municipal permit is applied for, and the mangrove buffer is protected and inspected. The other island communities carry their own developer or community layer, and on a private plot on the mainland there may be no community layer at all. We confirm which applies on the first visit.

Whichever path your plot takes, the drawings, the submissions and the follow-up are inside our scope. We do not mobilise until the approvals are back, and we will not guess a date for them on this page: they depend on the community and the authority, not on us.

What a garden and pool cost in Abu Dhabi

The rates on our cost guide are taken from our own priced bills of quantities on villa projects in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, and an Abu Dhabi plot is priced the same way: line by line, after a visit. Whether the brief is a whole villa garden designed as one (front and back, hardscape, planting, irrigation and lighting) a large plot with an engineered pool that leads the scheme, or one area done properly, the figure comes from your own plot after the free visit, not a number on a web page.

Below that (a lawn refresh, a single repair, routine maintenance) a maintenance firm will serve you better than a design-and-build contractor, and we would rather say so now than after a visit.

Swimming pool contractor in Abu Dhabi: what the ground decides

A swimming pool in Abu Dhabi is an engineering problem before it is a finish. On the island communities the ground is reclaimed sand and sabkha with a high water table, so the shell is designed against uplift, the excavation is dewatered while we build, and the waterproofing and the drainage are specified for what is actually under the plot rather than copied from the last job. Fixings near the coast are stainless, because mild steel does not last in the salt air.

Inland, on the mainland plots, the water table is the smaller problem and the summer is the larger one. There the pool is sized and its plant room specified around how the family will use it, and the shade around it is designed with it: an unshaded terrace makes an expensive pool unusable from May to October.

Either way the pool, the terrace levels, the falls and the plant room are drawn in one set with the garden. The community or developer approves first, then the Abu Dhabi Municipality building permit follows, and both packs are inside our scope. We do not mobilise until they are back.

Pool and landscape as one job

The expensive mistakes in a villa garden happen at the joins: the pool is built by one company, the paving by another, and the levels, the drainage and the plant room are nobody’s responsibility. We design the pool, the terraces, the planting and the shade as one drawing set, with one bill of quantities, so the pool position, the falls and the plant room are decided together rather than discovered on site.

That is also why we ask to see the whole plot on the first visit, even when the brief is only the pool.

How the project runs

A designer at the villa within 48 hours. The design with visuals and the priced bill of quantities in seven days. A Preview walk at full scale, so the pool position and the terrace levels are settled before we dig. The approval packs on sign-off. Then a live tracker through the build: the programme, the photographs and the money against the BOQ, one line at a time.