Opinions on dark pool finishes

[JFarr]

Afternoon all,

We bought a house with a pool 9 months ago. We are currently looking to renovate said pool. The plaster and tile are in rough shape and the coping is pretty dated.

As you can see we have four massive live oaks that overhang the pool. That photo was taken just after noon and is pretty much the maximum sun exposure for our pool.
I've been thinking about going with an exposed pebble or quartz finish and choosing a dark one. Either dark gray, dark blue, or even black. My thought is this would help the pool run a little warmer and help with the aggravating stains caused by the oaks.
However, of the pool contractors we've had out they're 50/50 on this idea. About half think it would look great in our pool and the other half think it's a huge mistake. I would like to hear the opinion of anyone who has experience with darker pool finishes.

Thank you all for your time

 

[bmoreswim]

The biggest complaints from dark finishes are their propensity to not be uniform in color resulting in a marbled (or maybe some less flattering term like splotchy - or even issues due to improper installation techniques).

The following links to a few threads discussing the last item. White spots on darker plaster

The PB who have issues with it have probably had customer complaints from it.

 

[JJ_Tex]

Make sure you consider the heat as a darker finish will have hotter water temps. That may be great in March and October, but not so great in July and August.

 

[JFarr]

For sure I'm considering the temperature. Because of all the shade our pool gets we weren't able to comfortably swim this year until the end of June. Only then did it climb above the mid 70's. Even now at the end of July the pool is 79-80 in the morning and 82-83 in the evenings. This is with solid triple digit weather for a month straight.
I'm guessing it will be back to 70's as soon as the weather is sub 100 degrees. I would like to extend the swim season on our pool beyond 2 months a year.