Hampton Accommodation, Hotels, Tours & Information

Hampton

Hampton is at the centre of the Bayside City municipality which stretches south along the Port Phillip Bay foreshore from Brighton to Beaumaris.

The municipality hugs a coastal corridor that covers 37sqkm of some of Melbourne's most expensive real estate. The area's affluence is reflected in the fact that homes in this inner Melbourne precinct command prices 60 per cent higher than the metropolitan average.

In fact the suburb of Hampton began as a seaside retreat for Melbourne's well-to-do who gathered in the hotel salons and coffee gardens in the shade of tea tree groves on Pic-Nic-Point in the 1880s.

Pic-Nic-Point was renamed Hampton both because a market gardener, Dyas Hampton, tilled the local earth and because the burghers fancied the English ring of the name.

These days the region offers locals and visitors a full range of recreational land and water pursuits and, through the city council"s Coastal Art Trail, the chance to retrace the steps of the legion of famous painters inspired by the local seascape.