After returning from Grand Plaza’s outdoor pool area on Tuesday, I decided to try to pull together what photos I could of any and all outdoor pools at new condo high-rises. Of the roughly 75 active condo high-rises in downtown Chicago, only about a dozen have outdoor pools that are currently open for business. From those, I was able to dig up photos of five, and I hope to follow up on some of the others in the South Loop and River North in the next week.
The rub on swimming pools is that they drive up assessments, and in Chicago outdoor pools can only be used for a fraction of the year. But on those select few days when you get to step out of the elevator in sandals and saunter out to the pool area, those thoughts should recede from memory.
Here’s a sampling of outdoor pools we’ve seen recently. Let us know which ones you like and which ones you don’t — but most of all, which pool would you want to call your own?
Aqua, 225 N Columbus Dr in Lakeshore East
R+D659, 659 W Randolph St in the West Loop
757 Orleans @ Chicago, 757 N Orleans St in River North
ParkView, 505 N McClurg Ct in Streeterville
Grand Plaza Penthouses, 545 N Dearborn St in River North