Elstree

Elstree is the village whose name sits on a century of film credits, and almost none of that filming happened in it. The studios are in Borehamwood, which has spent decades watching the smaller place next door take the bow. The Northern line was meant to turn up in the 1930s and never made it, so the village still runs on the old Roman road into London, with a runway out the back for anyone who finds the traffic beneath them. What you buy here is the famous name and the original village, while the neighbours do the work.