Edward William Mountford

Edward William Mountford (22 September 1855 – 7 February 1908) was an English architect, noted for his Edwardian Baroque style, who designed a number of town halls – Sheffield, Battersea and Lancaster – as well as the Old Bailey in London.

[2] In 1872 he was articled to Messrs. Habershon & Pite of Bloomsbury Square, where his contemporaries included William Howard Seth-Smith and A. R. G. Fenning, later acting as the practice's Clerk of Works.

[3] His profile was raised immeasurably by winning the competition for the design of Sheffield Town Hall (1890–1897), a grand palatial structure reflecting and serving as a symbol of the civic pride of the newly autonomous northern metropolitan council.

Mountford is seen as one of the initiators of the Wrenaissance style of Baroque Revival architecture which characterises many British and Empire public buildings during the Edwardian era;[2] Edwin Lutyens was a fellow exponent of the style – and Mountford and Lutyens had a form of connection via their work in Munstead Heath, where Lutyens designed Munstead Wood for Gertrude Jekyll and Mountford build Munstead Grange – Jekyll advising on his garden design – as his country house.

This naming reflects recognition of his architectural legacy, including his design of significant public buildings like the Old Bailey, which remains a key component of the UK’s legal heritage.