Balwyn is a suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 10 km east of Melbourne's Central Business District. Its local government area is the City of Boroondara. At the 2011 Census, Balwyn had a population of 12,944.Well known for its high quality family lifestyle and many leafy streets, Balwyn is among Melbourne's most exclusive and desirable suburbs.Balwyn in the north is separated from Balwyn North by Belmore Road, bounded in the west by Burke Road, in the south by an irregular line along Mont Albert Road, Northcote Avenue and Whitehorse Road and in the east by a line some distance to the east of Union Road.Whitehorse Road runs east-west along the ridgeline through the centre of Balwyn. Balwyn Road runs north-south from Koonung Creek Reserve (adjacent to the Eastern Freeway) to Canterbury Road.The south west part of Balwyn was excised as the suburb of Deepdene in 2010.HistoryBalwyn was part of Henry Elgar's Special Survey of 8mi2 in 1841, which was subdivided into small farms and grazing runs.In the late 1850s Andrew Murray, commercial editor and political writer for The Argus newspaper, bought land on the hill overlooking Canterbury Gardens. He named his house Balwyn from the Gaelic bal and the Saxon wyn, meaning 'the home of the vine'. Balwyn Road and the district were named after it. The house was located on the site that is now part of Fintona Girls' School.