Garston

Post to the south Watford North
Post to the east River Colne, Meridian Estate


Apple Tree Walk
Stanborough Primary School. This is a coeducational independent day and boarding school. It stands in 40 acres of parkland, was founded by the Seventh-day Adventist church and remains under the governance of the church. It was founded in 1919 and originally catered primarily to the children of overseas missionaries. The Primary section moved to a new facility in 1974

Cow Lane
Lea Farm. The farm stood on what is now the north side of Cow Lane.
Lea Farm Cottages
Sun Chemical Ltd. The factory which manufactured Inks for the print trade opened in 1952 and closed down in 2006. Sun is a multi-national chemical company originating with American and French firms in the mid-19th. The factory had originally been built here for Ault and Wiborg, an American printing ink firm which had become wholly British. It was designed by Wallis Gilbert and sited opposite the Odhams Print Works who they supplied with ink.  There were special fire safety measures and storage tanks built underground.  The site was eventually sold to Barratts for some more crappy housing.

Edward Amey Close
Edward Amey was a local politician and mayor of Watford
Built on the site of Garston Infants School. The school closed in 2005.

First Avenue
Lea Farm Recreation Ground Children's playground, Outdoor gym, two tarmac tennis courts
Telephone Exchange. This Situated has the code LWGAR. It is fronted by the original redbrick building with modern extensions behind. It provides services to Bricket Wood, Leavesden Green, Meriden, Kingswood and Woodside.
Garston Spiritualist Church. The Garston Brotherhood of Spiritualists was founded in 1944 by Mr and Mrs Jack Gray. With help of friends, and a mortgage on they bought a plot of land in First Avenue and fun raised for a new building which opened in 1948. The church continues.

Fourth Avenue
The Grove ‘Academy’. This was Berrygrove Primary School. This was opened in 2005 and replaced Meriden Primary, Garston Infants and Lea Farm Junior (formerly Garston Junior) Schools.
Berrygrove Children’s Centre

Garsmouth Way
Meriden Park. This has a childrens' playground designed by children, for children and a community centre with a broad range of public activities

Garston Lane
Garston Station. Opened in 1966 it lies between Bricket Wood and Watford North on London Overground Line to Euston via Watford Junction. It consists of one unstaffed platform but in 2010 it got new signage and artwork by children from Berry Grove Primary School [

North Western Avenue
ASDA. This supermarket is in the site and building of Odhams Press. The founder of Odhams was William Odhams, born 1812 in Sherborne. He was a compositor who began his own printing business. The firm gradually moved into bulk print of periodicals. Odhams (Watford) Ltd. was established in 1935, to-do high-speed colour photogravure printing.  Building began in 1935 in a site dominated by a gas holder. One vast building was put erected plus wells, power plant, new roads, and a canteen for the workers and a car park. During the Second World War, they printed leaflets, for the Government as well as repairing aeroplanes. In 1954, work started on a massive new multi-storey building and began the use of colour in newsprint.  In 1961 they were taken over by Fleetway and the Mirror Group and n 1963 this became the International Publishing Corporation (IPC). In the mid 1960s, a modernisation programme made it possible to print colour on both sides of the paper, In the 1970s, Odhams (Watford) was still the largest gravure printing plant in the UK but new technology meant many job losses at the plant. NT. IN 1982, Robert Maxwell bought Odhams from Reed International for £1.5 million.  This included not only the factory, land, and machines, and the works was closed down, many workers transferred to Sun Printers. The remaining buildings date from 1954 built to the designs of Yates, Cook & Derbyshire. The massive clock tower it houses a tank for holding water during the printing process.
Brookside Metal Co Watford Foundry, Owned by Metal Traders.1968 Queen's Award to Industry for Export Achievement

Railway Line from Garston
The north/south railway line on which Garston Station is sited is the Abbey Line opened by the London & Birmingham Railway, from London Euston to Boxmoor in 1837.  In the area south of the station was a large complex of sidings. These were between Cow Lane and North Western Avenue. Colne Way

St.Albans Road
609 Seventh day Adventist church. The Church was part of a complex of Seventh Day Adventist buildings based in Stanborough Park mainly in the square to the west. They originally had set up a church in the town of Watford but the need for an on-site church became apparent. The church opened in 1928. An extension and galleries were added to the building in 1962. In 2015 a project to extend and refurbish was completed with an official opening ceremony performed by the Mayor of Watford
Stanborough Park, the 75-acre Cottrell estate, was purchased in 1906 by the British Union Conference of the Seventh-Day Adventists. The majority of this complex stands in the square to the west.
Stanborough Centre. Opened in 2001, this adds 4 more halls to the original church. It is mainly used as a centre for community events and health and family related issues as well as a centre for local amenity organisations.
Headquarters building of the British Union Conference of Seventh Day Adventists. This was, erected in 1961 and is now the Adventist Discovery Centre - previously called the Voice of Prophecy. H. M. S. Richards, a Seventh-day Adventist evangelist, ran a radio programme known as the Voice of Prophecy which was the start of the Adventist Bible Correspondence Schools internationally.  The Adventist Discovery Centre continues this tradition.
Peace garden. A memorial garden, on the grounds of Stanborough Park, Watford, was officially opened on the International Day of Peace, Wednesday 21 September, in remembrance of those who took a stand for their pacifist and Sabbatarian beliefs.
Stanborough Park College of Music. This is part of the facilities of the Stanborough Centre.
Langley House. NHS rehabilitation centre.
The Dome roundabout. This is on the A41 Watford Bypass, built in the 1920s, where it intersects with the A412 St Albans Road. The St Albans Road was one of the first locally to be remodelled as a bus priority route in the early 1990s. At the roundabout, supermarket are on both sides of the road
530 Garston Fire station.  Full time fire station.  It includes the Thorpe Room used for community events.
524 Lemarie Centre for Charities.  Accommodation for charities events and offices
501 Well Being Centre.  Mental health support centre
Library. Opened in 1937 s and designed by the Borough Architect W. W. Newman, L.R.I.B.A.
Odeon Cinema. This was to be called the Ritz but was bought during construction by Odeon and opened in 1937. It had a plain brick facade in brick and a cafe in the front upstairs.  The auditorium was designed by J. Owen Bond, with honeycombe plasterwork. Lighting was indirect, with coloured variations. However it never had access to first release films and was put up for sale in 1959 and closed .It became a garage and a Little Waitrose but was demolished in 1989. A block of flats was built on the site.


Sources
Cinema Treasures. Web site
Hertfordshire churches
Hertfordshire County Council. Web site
SABRE. Web site
Seventh Day Adventist Web ire
Skinner. Form and Fancy.
Sun Chemicals. Web site
Watford Council. Web site