[8] Together with Winnington Road and Ingram Avenue, it is named after Arthur Winnington-Ingram, who as Bishop of London owned much of the surrounding area following a land grant in 1904.

Most of the land was sold privately in the early 20th century, and today only one house on the road is owned by the Church (46, The Bishops Avenue) and a nearby residential home.

[8] Most of the properties in the most expensive part of the avenue are registered to companies in tax havens including the British Virgin Islands, Curaçao, the Bahamas, Panama, and the Channel Islands, allowing international owners to avoid paying stamp duty on the purchase and to remain anonymous.

[8] Owners of houses on the street include the Sultan of Brunei and members of the House of Bolkiah, publisher and newspaper magnate Richard Desmond,[3] art collector and philanthropist Poju Zabludowicz,[8] industrialist Lakshmi Mittal,[10] and property tycoon Andreas Panayiotou.

[2] Former residents of the street have included Iraqi businessman Nemir Kirdar, Sir Billy Butlin, Dame Gracie Fields, Katie Boyle, Sir Peter Saunders (producer of the play The Mousetrap), the businessmen Asil Nadir and Emil Savundra[3] and Heather Mills (the former wife of Paul McCartney), who owned an apartment there.