In the early 1800s the Sea to Sky corridor was known as the Pemberton Trail and was briefly used as a cattle trail that ended at Burrard Inlet. In 1889, distinctive twin peaks in the North Shore mountains were dubbed the Lions by a Judge Gray, for their supposed resemblance from Vancouver to the lion statues on London's Trafalgar Square. They are the Transformed Sisters, Ch'ich'iyúy Elxwíkn, of Coast Salish legend. The small bay on Howe Sound where pre-road climbers were dropped off to climb them was the "Lions Bay."
The Brunswick Beach area was surveyed in 1908 and the first home built in 1911. Norman's Lodge was constructed on Brunswick Point in 1929. In the 1940s St. Mark's Church Camp was established where the Marina and Beach Park are today. 100 acres were sold in 1945 for development and soon summer cottages sprang up along the foreshore. Access was by boat until the opening of the railway in 1954 and the highway in 1958, when permanent residents including families with children began to arrive. Homes "up the hill" from the earlier waterfront cottages were built, and people shared four-party telephone lines to the rest of the world.
Locval government changed in 1971 from Water Improvement District to Village Municipality. Development of the Kelvin Grove neighbourhood began in the 1980s, and Lions Bay amalgamated Brunswick Beach in 1999. Currently there are about 530 homes in the community, with 25-30 vacant lots within present boundaries.