Cottesloe Beach is a popular beach in Cottesloe and one of the most iconic locations of

Western Australia Western Australia (commonly abbreviated as WA) is a state of Australia occupying the western percent of the land area of Australia excluding external territories. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to t ...

. The enduring popularity of the beach is the result of combinatuon of factors including proximity to metropolitan Perth, accessibility by

train In rail transport, a train (from Old French , from Latin , "to pull, to draw") is a series of connected vehicles that run along a railway track and transport people or freight. Trains are typically pulled or pushed by locomotives (often ...

, shelter from strong summer breezes and presence of offshore reefs making it a relatively safe swimming location.
Indiana Teahouse Conservation Management Plan
' (25 March 2021). Urbis. It has been recognised by the

Heritage Council The Heritage Council ( ga, An Comhairle Oidhreachta) is an organisation created by the Irish government to "engage, educate and advocate to develop a wider understanding of the vital contribution that our heritage makes to our social, environmenta ...

as a place of cultural significance since 2005. Since the beginning of the twentieth century a succession of bathing structures and hotels have been constructed in prominent locations overlooking the

beach A beach is a landform alongside a body of water which consists of loose particles. The particles composing a beach are typically made from rock, such as sand, gravel, shingle, pebbles, etc., or biological sources, such as mollusc s ...

. The current beach-front structure was constructed in 1996 and is known as the Indiana Teahouse. Designed in a neotraditional architectural style it has become an internationally recognised landmark of Perth. The beach hosts the popular

Rottnest Channel Swim The Rottnest Channel Swim is an annual open water swimming event from Cottesloe Beach through Gage Roads to Rottnest Island, off the coast of Western Australia, near Perth. Format The distance is and it is one of the largest open water swi ...

, and

Sculpture by the Sea The Sculpture by the Sea exhibition in Sydney and Perth is Australia's largest annual outdoor sculpture exhibition. This exhibition was initiated in 1997, at Bondi Beach and it featured sculptures by both Australian and overseas artists. In 200 ...

. It attracts around 600,000 visitors per year.

Location

The beach is located along the coast of the suburb of

Cottesloe, Western Australia Cottesloe is a western suburb of Perth, Western Australia, within the Town of Cottesloe. Cottesloe was named for Thomas Fremantle, 1st Baron Cottesloe, a prominent Tory politician and the brother of Admiral Sir Charles Fremantle for whom th ...

, and spans along the coast, between North Cottesloe Beach to the north and Mosman Park Beach to the south. It lies on the

Indian Ocean The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or ~19.8% of the water on Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia to the east. To the south it is bounded by ...

History

The beach has been one of the most popular beaches in

since the 1880s when the suburb of Cottesloe was established. In 1898 the first refreshment stalls and bathing pavilions appeared on the beach. Six years later a jetty was constructed, but destroyed in the storms of the same year. A more steardy construction 100m in length was constructed four years later and became known as the Cottesloe Pier. The beach has been patrolled and kept by Cottesloe Surf Life Saving Club since the club's official opening in 1909 as part of

Surf Life Saving Australia Surf Life Saving Australia (SLSA) is an Australian not-for-profit community organisation that promotes water safety and provides surf rescue services. SLSA strives to create a safe environment on Australia's beaches and coastline through patro ...

. This was the first lifesaving club in Australia. The Indiana Tea House was a building constructed in 1910 and replaced by the Centenary Pavilion in 1929. When the building became unstable it was demolished and replaced with a small beach pavilion in 1983. The structure was too small and in the mid-1990s the Town of Cottesloe sought expressions of interest for the design of multi-purpose building. The Town selected a neotraditional design by architect Lawrence Scanlan that drew influences from the earlier Centenary Pavilion. The building was built over the foundations of the 1983 pavilion and was completed in 1996. Since 2016 Lawrence has been seeking approval for a new Cottesloe Pier structure that will include an underwater observatory, swimming enclosure and pavilions. In 2020,

Andrew Forrest John Andrew Henry Forrest (born 18 November 1961), nicknamed Twiggy, is an Australian businessman. He is best known as the former CEO (and current non-executive chairman) of Fortescue Metals Group (FMG), and has other interests in the mining i ...

purchased the lease for Teahouse and proposed the demolition and redevelopment of the building in a contemporary architectural style.

The Pylon

In December 2008 the Town voted to restore the pylon, a concrete structure built in 1935, at a cost of $172,000. Decades of battering by the ocean has eroded the pylon, which was one of three pylons built to anchor a

shark net A shark net is a submerged section of gillnets placed at beaches designed to intercept large marine animals including sharks, with the aim to reduce the likelihood of shark attacks on swimmers. Shark nets used are gillnets which is a wall of net ...

following a fatal attack in 1925. Two were destroyed by storms in 1937. Since then it has become an iconic landmark and a popular diving platform for beach users. During major storm activity on 21–22 May 2009, the spike was knocked off the pylon. However this is not the first time this has occurred; during storms in 1995, the spike was also knocked over. It then remained on the bottom of the ocean in approximately 3 metres of water until a group from Swanbourne Nedlands Surf Life Saving Club removed the structure using nothing but wood, rope and surfboards in 1997. After the pylon was restored, it was painted in the Cottesloe Surf Lifesaving Club colours, but it was soon changed to the colours of North Cottesloe Lifesaving Club. The colours of the pylon change almost yearly, with the annual

attracting thousands of tourists to Cottesloe Beach. Before the event, members from Swanbourne Nedlands Surf Life Saving Club, North Cottesloe Surf Life Saving Club and Cottesloe Surf Life Saving Club compete to paint the pylon their club colours in order to gain publicity for their club.

Significant events

In 1991, at Cottesloe Beach, 16 solo swimmers participated in the first formal

. By 1998 the event had become the one of the world's largest open-water swimming events with 1150 participants. In 2005 a companion event to the Sydney-based

was launched on Cottesloe Beach. Although extremely popular (it draws crowds of over 200,000 per year) the event has struggled financially from the outset.

References

{{coord, 31, 59, 38, S, 115, 45, 04, E, type:landmark_region:AU-WA, display=title Cottesloe, Western Australia Beaches of Western Australia