It is an inner-suburban area located 5.8 miles (9.4 km) north of Charing Cross.

The area takes its name from one of the manors of Tottenham, Dovecotes, or Duckett's.

[1] The manor house itself was situated further north in the centre of what is today Wood Green.

[2] With agriculture being the main activity in this small area, population remained sparse until the middle of the nineteenth century.

By 1860 a few houses had been built along West Green Road just to the east of the junction with Green Lanes and stretching northward, facing Duckett's Common, as far as Duckett's farm-house, then called Dovecote House.