The enantiomerically pure glycine derivatives (R)‐ and (S)‐Boc‐BMI, commercially available on a kg scale, are used as starting materials (Scheme 1) for the preparation of (i) open‐chain amino acids such as α‐deuterio amino acids (4, 5), β‐arylalanines (2), aspartic acid derivatives (6, 7a, 8), or ω‐halo amino acids (7b, c, 12, 13, 16, 17, 19, 22), (ii) of α‐aminocycloalkanecarboxylic acids (9, 11), and (iii) of heterocyclic α‐amino acids (14, 15, 18, 20) containing azetidine, pyrrolidine, piperidine or perhydroazepine rings. Inversion by deprotonation / protonation or deuteration allows to prepare either enantiomer of an amino acid from the same Boc‐BMI enantiomer (Scheme 5). Effects of additives such as the cyclic urea DMPU, lithium salts, or secondary amines upon the reactivity of lithium enolates are discussed and, in part, exploited.