Part 2: St Kilda by the Sea

While St Kilda’s natural and man-made delights had attracted visitors from the 1840s, it was the opening of the railway line from Melbourne in 1857, and then the addition of cable trams in the 1880s, that established St Kilda as a fashionable and accessible seaside resort.

From the 1850s bathing in the sea began to be popular, although open sea bathing was illegal in daylight hours until 1917. To ensure modesty and decorum were preserved, seaside resorts like St Kilda hosted a number of ‘bathing machines’. Bathing boxes were used as changing rooms and shielded the body from view in the water. In the early days these contraptions were on wheels and were pulled into the sea by horses for the duration of the sea bath or ‘swim’.

Captain Kenney, one of the early entrepreneurs of sea bathing, established a bathing ship for men on the St Kilda foreshore. Eliezer Montefiore’s delicate watercolour of Kenney’s Bathing Ship for Gentlemen depicts the Nancy, a ship Kenney bought in 1854, and scuttled near the St Kilda pier. Kenney’s bathing ship operated until 1912. Female bathers were accommodated onshore by separate facilities operated by Kenney’s wife and daughters.

Another local St Kilda identity of the late 19th century, Mary Anderson, is featured in a photograph titled Granny’s Shop. Known to countless children as ‘Granny’, Mary first began selling sweets and fruit from a basket on the Esplanade in 1863. She was 75 years old and determined to keep out of the colonial workhouse, the Melbourne Benevolent Asylum. According to contemporary accounts she wore a black dress with a white apron and granny cap. She caught the attention of James Mooney, proprietor of the Royal Hotel on the Esplanade, and local councillor Henry Tullett, who arranged for a cupboard to be attached to a nearby gum tree to assist Granny with her business. Such was Granny’s popularity that when a storm swept away both the tree and her cupboard in 1864, it was reported in the newspaper. The community rallied, and a fundraising concert was held to help build a weatherboard stall to accommodate Granny and her business. Granny’s shop closed in 1872, and the council demolished the structure. Granny was admitted to the Benevolent Asylum that year and died not long after, at the age of 85.

The beach was not the only attraction for visitors to St Kilda in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In addition to bathing and a stroll along the esplanade or pier, visitors could enjoy donkey rides, puppet shows, refreshments at the tea gardens and shows at an outdoor theatre. And, from 1910 they could be entertained at the Palais de Danse or, from 1912, explore the thrills of the ultimate centre for amusement, Luna Park.

Despite its many attractions and cosmopolitan nightlife, cake shops and cafes, St Kilda went into decline from the 1950s to the 1970s, when increased car ownership enabled holidaymakers to venture further afield. Mansions and guesthouses were converted into rooming houses to accommodate low-income earners. But with its recent gentrification, St Kilda has again become a stylish place to live, and to see and be seen.