Great Woolstone and Little Woolstone are two historic villages in modern Milton Keynes, now called jointly Woolstone or The Woolstones and forming the heart of a new district of that name.
The Village and parish name comes from the Anglo-Saxon “Weitfraige’s Tun”; the street names are taken from local history eg. Pattison Lane and William Smith Close.
The ‘grid square’ has been developed for housing and as a linear park. Pattison Lane acts as the main distributor road taking traffic away from the old villages, which were in decline. The villages are interesting and include the 14th Century Holy Trinity Church, now also used as a community centre. William Smith Close is named after a local farmer who invented the steam plough, there is also a 19th Century church now used as a music centre and two country pubs, The Cross Keys and The Barge.
Many of these and other buildings have been listed, especially in the Conservation Area around Little Woolstone. The scale and character of the area is being maintained in the development of open spaces and housing. The linear park has been developed along the flood valley of the river Ouzel, with poplar plantations in the north.