Following European settlement, the western end of Port Nicholson was called "Lambton Harbour," after the Earl of Durham, whose family name was Lambton. When the early European settlement was relocated from Petone to Lambton Harbour, the street which was formed along the foreshore was named Lambton Quay.
Lambton Quay appears on the 1840 plan by W M Smith, Surveyor General: Plan of the town of Wellington.
