Melbourne Street Art at Hosier Lane

One of the most popular things to do in Melbourne is Hosier Lane street arts, few minutes walk from Flinders Street Station and Federation Square. This is the hot spot for Melbourne graffiti!  We had our Dim Sum breakfast in Melbourne Chinatown and walk over to Hosier lane, only a few minutes’ walk.

I love visiting street arts, it is free, interesting, creative and unrestricted. I came across many street arts throughout my travel around the world. I also see the growth in popularity as work being exhibited in the streets.  In Singapore, we are proud of the colorful Kampong Glam Haji Lane.

Laneway Bars

Laneway Bars are available at Hosier Street, grab drinks or tapas snacks at Movida or Bar Tini.

Alternatively, you may want to get your breakfast Churros and Hot Chocolate here.  Spanish eat churros with hot chocolate for their breakfast and it’s not a dessert that you eat at the end of your meal.

The colorful arts in the street make us happy, thanks to these talented artists, we feel the whole street is alive. You need to look up high and low to search for these arts, search in every corner as it may give you some surprises.

Look up and you will see the tin with a man’s head on top.

When you look at the street arts, you will have lots of questions in your mind. You will be also analyzing these graffiti and artwork.

Political Voice

Each street art painting has a story to tell, including political statement or protest.  (Refer to picture above).

Street Arts vs Graffiti

In case you are not sure the difference, here is the explanation. Street art is usually painted with permission or commissioned. Graffiti is more of word-based. Graffiti is illegal everywhere in Australia, including Melbourne city. However, there are some exceptions- places where it is considered legal to draw graffiti and one of them is Hosier Lane.

Banksy – The Street Artist from the UK

Melbourne is a lot more open-minded and is more supportive of street arts or graffiti artists. There was a case where a piece of graffiti by famous graffiti artist, Banksy from Bristol UK was scrubbed off a wall in Hosier Lane by Melbourne city council. This has caused the public outcry and since then the Mayer mentioned that they respect graffiti artists and if Melbourne city is ever honored by another visit from Banksy, they will not remove his work.  By the way, Banksy’s artwork by stencils allegedly sold at $472,528 on eBay.

Artwork Changes Almost Daily

Not all the street arts here are great at Hosier Lane, some good and some average and some just graffiti.  These artwork changes regularly and during my visit, I saw there are artists with spray paint doing their masterpiece at the wall.  If you see something you like on Instagram you may not be able to find it here when you reach here.

Graffiti Bins

The bins here are all done by Graffiti where you see writing made on the surface with a form of artistic expression.

Final thoughts:

Hosier Lane is worth a visit since it is free, go and find out the street arts as it sparks up your imagination.