FUNBOY Pool Floats: The Best Picks Right Now

I have never met a giant inflatable swan I did not want to say hello to, so a brand built on them was always going to get my attention. FUNBOY started in 2015 when brothers Blake and Max Barrett and their wives, Raquel and Celeste, came home from a family vacation in Anguilla with a pool-float idea they could not shake. The brothers had competitive swimming backgrounds, and they wanted floats that looked designed rather than disposable.

It is still a family business in Venice Beach, and it oversees its products from first drawing to prototype, which they tell on their own site. I read that hands-on approach as the real point of view. It is less about lounging beside the water and more about making the pool the place everyone gathers, with shapes big and silly enough to pull a whole group into the same moment. In my daydream, an ordinary lazy afternoon becomes the one people remember because a float changed the mood of the entire pool.

The FUNBOY catalog is really a calendar of reasons to gather. Halloween Constant Air Polka Dot Pumpkin and Standing Ghosts 3 Pack take the inflatable joke onto the porch, while Vintage Tube, Chaise Lounger and Royal Yacht belong to summer water. Inflatable ShotSki Apres Ski 2-pack brings the same humor to a snowy slope, and Drink Station is the party sidekick when the pool itself is crowded.

Picture a late-summer evening where Royal Yacht stays in the water while Black & White Pack Of 3 Light Up Inflatable Pumpkin waits on the patio until October. A practical note: have a pump on hand before the party starts, and Electric Air Pump is the small add-on that saves your lungs. What I would skip: a novelty piece if you have nowhere to keep it once the season ends.

FUNBOY works best when I let it be what the Barretts set out to make: an invitation to play, not a performance of luxury. I would choose the float that fits the actual gathering and pass on the rest if the pool, patio or storage shed is already full. Start with one season you love, and see whether the object earns a place in next year's plans. Although I suspect the swan always does.