Loveladies is the most exclusive stretch of Long Beach Island — a section of Long Beach Township on the island's north end, between Barnegat Light and Harvey Cedars. It's known for large architect-designed homes on wide lots, beaches that stay quiet even in August, and an almost total absence of commercial development. That last part is by design, and it's exactly why people love it.
Loveladies is a section of Long Beach Township — township beach badges, parking rules, and services apply here.
Loveladies sits on the north end of LBI, south of Barnegat Light and — counterintuitively — north of Harvey Cedars. Many first-time visitors assume the townships run in neat blocks, but Long Beach Township is a patchwork: Loveladies is one of its northern pieces, wedged between two independent boroughs. It's about ten minutes from the Causeway, up Long Beach Boulevard.
Loveladies' beaches are among the quietest on the island — wide, backed by high dunes, and served by mostly private walkways with public access points along the boulevard. Long Beach Township badges apply here, and lifeguards cover designated beaches in season. On a weekday morning you can have a stretch of Atlantic practically to yourself.
The Long Beach Island Foundation of the Arts and Sciences — the island's cultural anchor — sits on the bay side of Loveladies. Founded in 1948, it runs year-round classes, exhibitions, lectures, and summer programs for kids, and its campus of studios and galleries is open to visitors. If Loveladies has a "downtown," this is it.
The name comes from Thomas Lovelady, a hunter from Waretown who kept a shack and shooting blinds on a small island in the bay here in the 1800s. When the U.S. Life-Saving Service opened Station #114 nearby in the 1870s, it took the name Lovelady's Island Station, and the name stuck to the surrounding shore. The area was briefly renamed Long Beach Park in the World War II era, but the old name won out — it's been officially Loveladies again since the 1950s.
There are almost no businesses in Loveladies — no restaurant strip, no shops — and residents like it that way. For food and supplies, Barnegat Light's restaurants and Viking Village are a few minutes north, and Harvey Cedars' small dining cluster is just south. The bay side is calm and shallow, good for paddleboarding and kayaking.
It's named for Thomas Lovelady, a Waretown waterfowl hunter who kept a gunning shack on a small bay island here in the 1800s. The U.S. Life-Saving Station built nearby in the 1870s was named Lovelady's Island Station, and the name spread to the whole section.
No — Loveladies is a section of Long Beach Township, not an independent borough. It sits between Barnegat Light and Harvey Cedars on the north end of LBI, and Long Beach Township beach badges and rules apply.
Almost none — Loveladies is deliberately residential. The nearest dining is in Barnegat Light a few minutes north (Mustache Bill's, Kubel's, Viking Village) or Harvey Cedars just south (Black-Eyed Susans, Harvey Cedars Shellfish Co.).
Travelers who want maximum quiet and privacy, architecture lovers, artists drawn to the LBI Foundation, and renters trading walkability for wide-open beaches.
