Concerned by the danger of fire in theatres, he worked with the actor Henry Irving to develop the Irving-Darbyshire safety plan which consisted of isolating separate parts of the theatre and providing fireproof escape routes.

[2] Other buildings designed by Darbyshire include Pendleton Town Hall, Manchester Corporation Abattoir, Alston Hall in Lancashire,[1] the Carnegie Library in Knutsford and the churches of St Cyprian and St Ignatius in Salford.

[2] Darbyshire was also involved in the design of several distilleries and factories for the Jameson family and was later engaged by Andrew Jameson to design a Tudor revival style mansion house for the family on Howth Head in the Northern suburbs of Dublin called Sutton House.

They became good friends and Alfred assisted Calvert with the staging of some of his great 'revivals' of Shakespeare's plays.

[citation needed] In 1872, he built a spectacular set for the triumphal entry of the King into London in Henry V. He reproduced the streets of London, the seaport of Southampton, the walled town of Harfleur, the battlefield of Agincourt, the palaces of Westminster and Rouen,[which?]

[citation needed] As a landscape painter, Darbyshire sketched and painted in Italy, France, Belgium, and Germany.

He was friendly with Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Ford Madox Brown, and Walter Crane.

Alfred could produce an intricate architectural watercolour depicting Durham Cathedral, or a busy colourful picture of a harbour in Whitby, now both in Stockport Art Gallery.

[citation needed] He published a volume The Art of the Victorian Stage, and innumerable pamphlets and brochures for occasions such as the Old Manchester and Salford Exhibition.