The facility, named The Floating Pool Lady in honor of its biggest champion, Ann L. Buttenwieser, is the result of a vision the urban planner and historian has worked for almost three decades to realize. While researching her dissertation on the history of the Manhattan waterfront, Buttenwieser came across the floating bathhouses that dotted the borough’s rivers in the 19th century. Inspired, she set up the Neptune Foundation with the mission of creating a prototype for a portable pool to provide, free of charge, much-needed recreational facilities for underserved communities.

Buttenwieser called on Manhattan architect Jonathan Kirschenfeld, who had related experience, having designed a 600-seat outdoor floating theater (as yet unrealized). Buttenwieser was a hands-off client, says Kirschenfeld. Beyond the standard programmatic specifications for a swimming pool, her only demand—in light of her strong belief in the coexistence of commercial and recreational interests on the urban shoreline—was that the barge relate to the existing industrial surroundings.