About Andy Jamieson

I build natural pools for a living. I teach people to build their own.

I am a professional natural pool designer and builder based in Cape Town, South Africa. Through my construction company, Leaf & Stone Natural Pools, I design and build living pools of every scale, from small plunge pools and chlorine pool conversions to large aquascapes with waterfalls and streams.

DIY Natural Pool Academy is where all of that field experience becomes something you can use. Every plan, consultation and guide I offer is based on systems we have actually built, tested and maintained. Not theory.

My background is in permaculture design, sustainable landscaping and soil microbiology. I am an accredited permaculture teacher, trained under Geoff Lawton and Rose Morrow, and I have taught practical skills to more than 500 students.

I live in an off-grid eco home with my family, where we cook off biogas made from our own waste, harvest our own water and eat from a 165 sqm food forest we planted ourselves. That lifestyle is exactly why I believe swimming water should be clean, living and chemical free.

My work has been featured by Insider SA, The Gardener magazine, Handyman and the Pond Digger podcast.

Field-tested, not theoretical

The pools you see across this site are real projects: pools we built professionally through Leaf & Stone, and pools that owners like you built themselves from Academy plans, with my support over WhatsApp and video call.

Browse the case studies to see how they came together, from bare earth to clear, living water.