The first inhabitants of Le Lavandou were Genoese and Catalan fishermen. Attracted by a particularly rich maritime area, they gathered in a hamlet located on the site of the current old port built in 1880. In 1913, when the locality of Le Lavandou was created administratively, it comprised 150 fishermen out of 776 inhabitants. It was then the first fishing port in the Var department with almost 297,000 pounds (135,000 kg) of fish caught per year.