Place Name
Historically in Hampshire, Durford is the name of a number of scattered properties, most notably the site and pitiful remains of Durford Abbey, which was transferred to West Sussex in boundary changes. Although some of Durford forms part of the parish of Liss in Hampshire. The name comes from the Old English words dēora ford and means the animals’ river crossing. In 1951 the architect’s department at the London County Council selected this area of Roehampton as the site for one of the largest and most radical housing developments ever undertaken in London – the Alton Estate. At the time of its completion in 1958, Alton West was considered by many British architects to be the crowning glory of post-World War II social housing. The estate itself takes its name from Alton Lodge, an early-19thCentury villa on the Kingston Road, occupied by Dr Thomas Hake from around 1854 until 1872. Seizing on this as a naming opportunity, the local government chose to name almost all of the other roads on the Alton Estate after places in Hampshire.
