Last summer, photographer Roy Inman was standing in front of a fountain at a roundabout near West 129th Street and Glenfield Road in Leawood, Kansas. The sky was a deep, sapphire blue and a full moon was rising. Pools of water glowed emerald green.
Inman has photographed almost every fountain in Kansas City, but this one was new to him. He said he knew at that moment he was capturing something special.
"That fountain just said: 'Look at me. I'm just so gorgeous and glorious,'" Inman remembered. "It was just an amazing display — Lord have mercy."
Known as the City of Fountains, Kansas City features more than 200 at major landmarks and tucked into suburban neighborhoods.
Inman knows them all intimately. More than a decade ago, Inman photographed each fountain for the first edition of "The City of Fountains: Kansas City's Legacy of Beauty and Motion," published in 2012 by Kansas City Star Books.
The project took the entire summer.
“I just grabbed my flip flops, my surfing shorts, and my waterproof camera," Inman said. “It was 100 degrees for days and days in a row, which is the perfect time to shoot fountains."
At first, Inman thought it would be an easy job.
"It's not," he said, "for a number of reasons."
"You have to scout each fountain and make sure that you're there at the right time to catch the right light, so it's actually quite a task," Inman said.
In each of his photographs, water glints against electric blue skies. Bronze and marble sculptures bathe in late afternoon light. Streams of water flow into glowing pools at night.
"It took the long, hot summer, and I got this wonderful tan," Inman laughed.
Each April, the metro celebrates Fountain Day to kick off the beginning of fountain season.
Joan Shields is a board member at the City of Fountains Foundation, which raises funds to construct new fountains and manages trust funds to pay for maintenance.
"Fountains are just such an important part of our community," Shields said. "When anyone from out of town that's never been to Kansas City (comes to visit), the first thing I do is take them on a tour of our fountains."
Shields said she enjoys all the city's fountains, but she does have one favorite. The Meyer Circle Sea Horse Fountain brings back happy childhood memories of visiting her grandparents.
"We lived in Prairie Village and, to see my grandparents, I'd ride my bicycle down Tomahawk Road and go right past that fountain," she said. "And I'd have to circle it a couple of times and then go to my grandparents' house."
She still thinks of them whenever she drives past it on Ward Parkway.
Shields began making plans to celebrate her organization's 50th anniversary last year. She said it seemed like a good opportunity to update Inman's book. In the decade or so since it was published, more than a dozen of the fountains Inman photographed stopped working.
"The old book had a lot of fountains that have either been moved, or they'd been damaged and removed," Shields said. "And then there were a bunch of new ones."
After doing some research, Shields asked Inman to revisit the project.
"Roy does such a beautiful job of photographing fountains," Shields said.
Sales of the new edition of the book benefit the City of Fountains Foundation, and arrive in local bookstores today. "The City of Fountains: Kansas City's Legacy of Beauty and Motion" is available at Rainy Day Books, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, The Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Union Station and Made in KC stores.
"I think we need we need to have beauty around us," Inman said. "It makes you feel better and it lifts the spirits."
Fountain Day kicks off at 2 p.m. on Friday, April 14, at the fountain in Mill Creek Park, West 47th Street and Mill Creek Parkway, Kansas City, Missouri 64111.
