[1] Ferrey was an early member of the Royal Institute of British Architects and a close friend of the designer Augustus Pugin (1812–52), who took his inspiration from the Gothic medieval styles of the pre-Reformation era.

Norton's association with Sir Peregrine Acland, who donated the £16,000 necessary to rebuild the former mediaeval church of St. Audries, bore further fruit with the commission to design Stogursey School in 1860.

In accordance with Ferrey and Pugin's prescient concerns for the inter-relationship of humanity and the environment it produces, Norton's designs called for the sourcing of construction materials from their locality.

In addition to the regular ecclesiastical commissions, Norton's London practice had designed the grand residences that line Crystal Palace Road in Sydenham.

Later that decade, Norton's reputation was enhanced with commissions to build Nutley Priory near Redhill, (Surrey), for the banker E.H.Gurney, Brent Knoll in the West Country for G.S.Poole, and Chewton Magna Manor for W.Adlam.

William Gibbs (1790–1875) had become a partner in the family trading company and by the time of Queen Victoria's accession in 1837 had, with his brother Henry, circumspectly steered their business through the French Wars and the dissolution of Spanish colonial interests.

Gibbs' Peruvian office had secured contracts for the export to Britain of guano, the nitrogen-rich deposits of seabird droppings that became a principal fertiliser for the increase of wheat yields.

William Gibbs now required a country seat for his family away from London and in 1843 purchased Tyntes Place, an attractive house with relatively simple and plain internal decoration that overlooked the Bristol Channel.

Reverend Seymour's restrained Regency house had been utterly absorbed, doubled in size and transformed into a soaring Gothic-revival masterpiece bristling with ornamentation born from its diverse construction elements.

[4] Tyntesfield remains at the zenith of Norton's designs but his architectural practice continued the ecclesiastical, country house and suburban output for which he was now rightly celebrated.

The high church interior of polychromed brick is enhanced by some good stained glass (though the fine east window has been partially blocked up due to weather damage) and a beautiful reredos of carved alabaster by Harry Hems of Exeter.

Other than his dynamic, traditional Christian faith and the references from William Gibbs' business-like diary, which note his satisfaction as to the progress at Tyntesfield, we know little of John Norton's personality.

Norton's London practice was in Old Bond Street, and in April 1862, despite being fully staffed he agreed that the young Hardy, who at the time sought apprenticeship in architecture,'...should come daily to the office and make drawings'.