Royal Pools by Adams designs and builds custom inground swimming pools throughout Midtown, the mid-century heart of Palo Alto between Oregon Expressway and Loma Verde. We are a Diamond Certified pool construction company based about 35 minutes down the Peninsula on Camden Avenue in San Jose, and we have been building Bay Area pools since 1969. Our five-step program takes your project from first sketch to first swim.
Midtown is post-war Palo Alto at its most coherent: a deliberate street grid of ranch homes and Eichlers built out in the 1950s. The city’s own Eichler tract map names Greer Park (1950 to 1951), Midfair, Fairpark, and Midcourt tracts in this part of town, and the city adopted Eichler Neighborhood Design Guidelines in 2018 to help preserve that character. We design pools the same way: clean mid-century geometry, honest materials, and sightlines that extend the glass-walled living areas straight into the backyard, because an Eichler deserves better than a generic kidney shape. The neighborhood’s one real construction variable sits below grade. Midtown occupies the flat Bayshore side of the city, where excavation can meet shallow groundwater, and Palo Alto regulates construction dewatering with its own permit program, including a limited seasonal pumping window and neighbor notification. We coordinate the dewatering plan with Public Works as part of the permit package through the city’s Accela portal, so the schedule is honest from day one. One reassurance for Greer Park North owners: the 2015 single-story overlay there governs two-story construction, not backyard pools.
Every photo below is from a real Royal Pools by Adams project. See more in our project gallery.
Royal Pools by Adams is part of the Adams Pool Group, a family-run organization that has been building and finishing pools since 1953. Every 28 Palms project is backed by the same leadership team that oversees every Royal pool in the Bay Area.
Owner & CEO, Adams Pool Group
General Manager, Royal Pools by Adams
We design and build pools across Midtown and its neighboring streets:
The core grid around the Middlefield and Colorado shopping district, the neighborhood’s daily hub.
The design-protective Eichler enclave around Moffett and Metro circles beside 22-acre Greer Park.
The small neighborhood grouped with Midtown on the city’s neighborhood map.
The blocks immediately south, sharing Midtown’s mid-century stock.
Our citywide Palo Alto page.
Yes. Pool projects run through the City of Palo Alto’s Planning and Development Services, with plans submitted digitally through the Accela Citizen Access portal. We prepare the drawings, manage plan review, and schedule the inspections.
It is common enough here that Palo Alto built a rulebook for it. Midtown sits on the flat Bayshore side of the city, and construction dewatering requires a plan and permit from Public Works, with a limited seasonal pumping window and neighbor notification. We fold the dewatering coordination into the project schedule instead of discovering it mid-dig.
That is some of our favorite design work. The city’s own tract map names Greer Park, Midfair, Fairpark, and Midcourt Eichler tracts in the Midtown area, and the right pool for those homes uses clean rectangular geometry, minimal coping, and a layout composed around the home’s glass walls so the water reads as part of the living space.
The 2015 overlay bans two-story homes and second-story additions in that enclave; it does not regulate pools. Your pool follows the standard citywide building-permit path, and we confirm any parcel-specific conditions during plan review.
Usually, yes. Midtown’s post-war grid lots are compact but regular, which rewards efficient rectangular designs, plunge pools, and pool-spa combos. We measure the real setbacks and access on your lot and design to them rather than forcing a template.
City of Palo Alto Utilities. Palo Alto runs its own municipal water utility, with supply purchased from the San Francisco regional system, most of it Sierra snowmelt from Hetch Hetchy. We schedule and manage the one-time fill with you.
Prefer to plan your project in person? Our San Jose showroom at 2258 Camden Ave is about 35 minutes from Midtown: take US-101 South to Highway 85 South and exit at Camden Avenue. Get directions from Midtown Palo Alto →
Part of Our Palo Alto Service Area
Start with a free design consultation at your home or in our San Jose showroom.
Royal Pools by Adams | 2258 Camden Ave, San Jose, CA 95124 | (408) 371-8000 | Mon-Fri 8am-4pm | CSLB #278052
