Bombay Beach is a census-designated place (CDP) in Imperial County, California, United States.

Despite this, by 2018, a number of people had moved into the area, and the town's many abandoned structures and features from its past have drawn visitors back in.

A 2018 article in The Guardian stated that it was "enjoying a rebirth of sorts with an influx of artists, intellectuals and hipsters who have turned it into a bohemian playground.

Celebrities such as Frank Sinatra, the Beach Boys, and Bing Crosby[7] frequented the luxury resorts along the Salton Sea, which was known for its fishing, boating and water skiing.

[7][8] Bombay Beach's decline began in the 1970s, when the runoff (full of salty chemicals) led to a warning that the salinity of the lake would no longer sustain wildlife; that occurred by the early 1980s.

[9][10] A report by the Pacific Institute in September 2019 stated that ten years earlier, "there were some 100 million fish in the Sea.

A visitor in 2019 wrote that there were many "discarded homes and trailers long-since abandoned" and that many of the buildings were "windowless husks blanketed in graffiti, surrounded by broken furniture and rubble.

"[12] The derelict "living ghost town" status of Bombay Beach has attracted many photographers, filmmakers, urban explorers, and tourists.

[15][16] In 2018, as people began to move back into Bombay Beach, house prices had risen; some bungalows were selling for "tens of thousands of dollars.

"[6] The community has held the Bombay Beach Biennale each spring since 2016, inviting "artists, academics, writers, and film-makers to create work, give lectures, and stage happenings".

[47][48][49] According to Paris-based art community Artchipel, Fauna said the place had a "big impact on her childhood and became a major influence in her life.

"[47] In an interview with Buffalo, New York alternative newspaper The Public's Cory Perla, she described it as "a very kind of post-apocalyptic-looking town.

[58] A 2013 promotional video for the fifth season of Animal Planet's River Monsters was filmed at Bombay Beach.

[59] Austrian singer Christina Stürmer used Bombay Beach as one of the settings for her video of the song "Millionen Lichter" ("A Million Lights)".

[60] In the CBS police procedural series The Mentalist, the first episode of the sixth season "The Desert Rose" was filmed in Bombay Beach, California.

[61] The production team created a sign for the fictional "Borrego Gas Diner" to stand-in for the local bar and restaurant Ski Inn.

[61] In 2015, the film Sky opens with an unhappily married French couple on vacation in the deserts of Southern California.