Pools: Lounging, Diving, Floating, Dreaming: Picturing Life at the Swimming Pool

by Lou Stoppard (Editor), Leanne Shapton (Foreword)

A celebratory ode to the joy and enduring allure of the swimming pool, and a gorgeous photography book to accompany poolside daydreaming.

Glamorous, seductive, and fun, made for lounging, frolicking, splashing, dipping, diving, floating, and escaping, swimming pools are symbols of both sport and leisure and conjure images of well-oiled bodies, colorful bikinis, and glimmering blue waters on hot summer days. Muse to writers, artists, photographers, and filmmakers, the swimming pool's careless opulence is splashed across the pages of this book in gorgeous images by contemporary photographers. In her second book for Rizzoli, curator, writer, and avid swimmer Lou Stoppard offers the promise of sunshine and the seduction of youth in her edit of some of the best contemporary swimming-pool photography.

Organized by theme, from the glamour of the poolside party to the simple, meditative pleasure of being in the water, the selected photographs are as inspiring as they are moving. Photographers whose images are featured in this book include Sølve Sundsbø, Glen Luchford, Stephen Shore, Mert & Marcus, Diana Markosian, Martin Parr, Martine Franck, Alex Webb, Alice Hawkins, and Nick Knight. This is the perfect gift purchase for photography fans, swimmers, and lovers of leisure.

240 pages, Paperback

Published April 7, 2020

About the author

Lou Stoppard’s work considers the ways that art and culture relate to broader societal shifts or dynamics. She likes uniting different mediums and finding unusual or unexpected stories and connections. She works across both digital and physical spaces, and writes both fiction and non-fiction.

She has written for The Financial Times, Aperture, The New York Times and The New Yorker. Her books include a survey of the work of street photographer Shirley Baker, published by MACK in 2019, Pools, an exploration of swimming in photography, published by Rizzoli in 2020, and Exteriors: Annie Ernaux and Photography, published by MACK in 2024, to time with an exhibition of the same name, which she curated at MEP, Paris in Spring 2024.

Stoppard holds a first-class BA in History from Oxford University, and an MA in Fashion from Central Saint Martins. She began her career at Nick Knight’s moving image platform SHOWstudio, where she became known for her live interviews with figures from across the fashion and photography worlds. Stoppard continues to host talks and panels, working with institutions such as the ICA and Studio Voltaire.