R Abraham
Robert Abraham (1774-1850) trained initially as a surveyor and is listed in directories of 1811 and 1829 in Keppel Street, London.  He was connected with John Nash’s Regent Street project – the County Fire Office at Piccadilly Circus was his, but by the 1820s he had come to specialise in housing, notably designs for and alterations to country houses in a variety of styles.  His clientele was mainly Roman Catholic and included the Duke of Norfolk, for whom he worked at Arundel and elsewhere.  In 1839 he was living in Torrington Street, London (Pigot’s Directory) and in 1841 at York Terrace, Regent’s Park.
Lit: BAL Biog file; Obit: The Builder 8 (1850) p602; DNB
Restored: Arundel, Fitzalan Chapel (1836)

A Acket
Antoine Theodore M Acket (1918-81) was a painter by 1952, when he exhibited a flower piece at the RA. and he continued to exhibit there at least until 1963.  At the earlier date his address was in Dulwich.  He was also involved in the design of at least one cafe in Central London. He later moved to Kent and spent the rest of his life in the Canterbury area.  His name might suggest he was not of English ancestry and there are instances of the name in Belgium, but his background and training are unknown.  He produced designs for glass, as at St Wilfrid, Haywards Heath, for C E Welstead Ltd of Croydon and Wainwright and Waring.
Glass: Haywards Heath - St Wilfrid

K Adams
Ken Adams is known only from one window that he designed for Cox and Barnard in c1950.
Glass: Southwick

Adams Johns Kennard
This long-established Hastings practice of architects and quantity surveyors, which also has a branch in Tunbridge Wells, has several partners who have been especially interested in projects involving the renovation of historic buildings.  More recently, they have concentrated mainly on schools and other educational buildings.  It is not known whether the partner named Kennard is connected with either of at least two architects of this name who practised in London in the early C20 (KD/L).
Restored/adapted: Hastings, - St Mary in the Castle (1990-98)

T Adye
Thomas Adye first appears in 1712 and died before 1762, when there is a reference to his widow.  His antecedents are not known, but from 1737 to 1744 he was sculptor to the Society of Dilettanti.  His monuments are characterised by large medallion portraits, held by putti, a motif derived from James Gibbs.
Memorial: Cuckfield

W Aikman
William Aikman (1868-1959) was the son of a landscape painter in Edinburgh, where he was apprenticed to the well established glass-making firm of James Ballantine, before moving to London in 1892.  There he worked for J Powell and Sons as a painter with J W Brown and trained J H Hogan.  He also had skills as a mosaicist, for during this period he assisted Sir William Richmond, who designed the mosaics in St Paul's.  In 1913 he established a studio of his own in Camden Square, London and thereafter taught at the Camberwell School of Art, where his pupils included G Cooper-Abbs and A E Buss, who became his assistant.  According to CCL 1920, he also designed memorial tablets.  He moved to Sutton, Surrey in 1934, where he continued to work until his death.
Obit: JBSMGP 13/1 (1959) pp364-65
Glass: Eartham

J S Alder
John Samuel Alder (1848-1919) was born in Birmingham and from 1867-72 was articled to G C Haddon and his brother H R Haddon in Malvern and Hereford.  Thereafter he became chief assistant to F Preedy, who was by this time working mainly in London, where Alder established his own practice in 1886 - in WWA 1914 he gives his address as Effingham House, 1 Arundel Street, Strand, where he was still to be found in 1919 (KD/L).  Between 1898 and his death (ibid) he had a partner, John Turrill, who continued the practice without changing the name until at least 1924, though he kept an independent entry for himself only in KD/L.  Turrill is the otherwise elusive J Turrill who worked on St Mary, East Grinstead in 1928.  Alder's churches were mostly in the expanding London suburbs and won praise because they were economical yet spacious, built in a simple and dignified late gothic style.
Lit: BAL Biog file
Competed alterations: Nuthurst (1907) 

F E Allen
Frances E Allen is described as ARIBA on the inscription recording her work in Henfield church in 1969, but the only record of her in RIBA records is her thesis on mediaeval painting in Sussex, written in 1947.  It thus seems clear that she was connected with the county.
Designed: Henfield, screen

G P Allen
George Pemberton Allen (1872-1956) was the son of a manufacturing engineer, with whom he was living at Cowfold in 1891.  He trained under F W Hunt of Baker Street, surveyor to Lord Portman’s estate, and was also a pupil of Sir A W Blomfield, with whose sons he worked on occasion.  He practised mainly in the Bedford area, designing churches, and from 1902 to 1911 he was a partner in the practice of Law and Allen, which also did work at Pagham church; nothing is known of Law.  In 1914 he briefly had an office on his own in Craven Street, Strand (KD/L) and thereafter disappears from London.  Allen's family latterly lived at Aldwick, then in the parish of Pagham, though his minimal obituary in The Builder states that he died at Welwyn Garden City, which suggests that his primary loyalties remained north of London.
Lit: BAL Biog file; Obit: The Builder 191 p81
Refitted: Pagham (1899)

Alleyn and Mansel
This practice first appears in Henley-on-Thames in 1935 and by 1946 was in London at Staple Inn, Holborn.  Directories show it remained there until about 1955, when it is listed on one occasion only at an office in High Street, Crawley.  Alleyn must be Justin Henry Alleyn (known as Tim) (1908-83), who is known from other sources to have had an address at Staple Inn in 1948.  He was educated at Ampleforth and Liverpool University and his early years in practice were interrupted by World War II.  He designed schools and churches before becoming mainly active in later life as an arbitrator and expert witness.  There is no other trace of a partner named Mansel, but during the period before 1980 Alleyn worked with P J C Durling at an address in Merstham, Surrey, which is quite close to Crawley.  During this time they worked on a number of churches locally.
Lit: BAL Biog file (for Alleyn); Obit (for Alleyn): RIBAJ 90 (Sept 1983) p123
Repaired: Stedham (1948-49) 

C Allwork
Charles Allwork, described as a local builder, though possibly primarily a carpenter, undertook repairs and alterations to Rottingdean church in 1818 and also repaired Ovingdean church in 1826, with a possibility of further work that lasted until 1828.  He is not known outside these dates, but David Allwork who was a builder in Rottingdean in 1839 (PD), is probably connected.
Repaired: Ovingdean (1826); Rottingdean (1818)

Sir L Alma-Tadema
Sir Laurence Alma-Tadema (1836-1912) was of Dutch birth and studied in Antwerp, before spending some time in Paris.  In 1870 he moved to London, where he settled and became highly successful – he was buried in St Paul’s.  He specialised in Roman scenes, often inspired by excavations at Pompeii, with tastefully undraped maidens and each of his works received an opus number.  He is not known for his designs for stained glass, though he made a number for furniture and designed those for his own residences.  Possibly the glass at West Stoke came from existing work rather than new designs. 
Lit: R Ash: Sir Laurence Alma-Tadema, 1989
Glass: West Stoke

C Almquist
Carl Almquist (1848-1924) was a pupil of H Holiday and H E Wooldridge (then associated with Holiday), who came to study in London in 1870 from his native Sweden.  He worked for Holiday after ceasing to be a pupil and settled permanently in England.  By 1873 he was associated with Shrigley and Hunt of Lancaster and became chief designer the following year, though he worked exclusively in the company’s London premises after these were opened in 1878.  He used the soft colours and delicate drawing of the aesthetic style of the 1870s and 1880s, derived from what he had learned from Holiday, and determined the firm’s style until well into the C20.  He continued working until his sight bagan to fail after World War I, when he retired to Hove, where he died.  
Lit: B R Lövgren: Carl Almquist (1848-1924) His Life and Work, JSG 21 (1997) pp11-40
Glass: East Hoathly

R Andrews
Richard Duncan Andrews trained at Cambridge university and joined Carden and Godfrey (see under W E Godfrey) in 1976.  He was elected to the RIBA in 1980 and is now a director of the practice.  He conserved the ruins of Lewes priory and has worked extensively on churches in Sussex, where those below are only three among many, though the practice's restoration of the vault at New Shoreham is likely to be among the most remarkable achievements of the practice anywhere.
Restored: East Guldeford (2009); New Shoreham (1998 onwards); Whatlington (2010-13) 

M Angus
Mark Angus (b 1949) comes from Bath.  After training initially as a chartered surveyor, he studied architectural stained glass at Swansea School of Art.  Since then he has produced glass mostly for churches in a modernistic style.  Much of his work is to be found in Germany where he also teaches.
Glass: Steyning

R Anning Bell
Robert Anning Bell (1863-1933) trained in London (RA Schools), Paris and Italy as a painter and architect, as well as illustrating books and designing other art works.  He taught initially at Liverpool University.  He also assisted Sir George Frampton and in 1911 moved to Glasgow, where he lectured at the School of Art and designed glass for J and W Guthrie of that city.  He returned to London by 1918, when he became professor of design at the Royal College of Art.  Already a member of the Art Workers Guild (see below), he became master in 1921.  He had earlier become a Royal Academician (ARA 1914 and advanced to RA in 1922) and was also well known as a mosaicist; his work is in the Palace of Westminster and Westminster cathedral.  Among other London manufacturers, Lowndes and Drury, A J Dix and A A Orr used his designs.
Lit: NAL Information File
Glass: Amberley

Architectural and Planning Partnership
See under J C T Warren

E L Armitage
Edward Liddall Armitage (1887-1967) trained under H Holiday, some of whose commissions he completed after Holiday's death, and was for some years in the 1920s a partner of Victor Drury (of Lowndes and Drury).  He is listed as a stained glass artist in KD/L at 43-45 Blenheim Crescent, W11 from 1930.  Subsequently he became chief designer for J Powell and Sons from c1940 until c1960 and he also wrote about stained glass.
Glass: Bexhill, - St Mark, Little Common (made by J Powell and Son); Chailey, - St Peter; Horsham, - St Mary; Rustington; Slinfold (made by J Powell and Son?); West Dean (W); West Itchenor

J Armstrong
John Armstrong (b1937) is a painter, who has specialised in Christian and other religious subjects and has taught at the University of Brighton.  He lives in Hove and has produced a substantial number of church notice boards that display a figure of the appropriate saint.  An example of these is to be found at Mayfield.
Paintings: Brighton and Hove, - Chapel Royal, painted sign; - St Peter, altarpiece; Mayfield; notice board 

Art Workers Guild
Though never involved in commissioning buildings or other works except for itself, the Guild has played a major part in the evolution of architectural thinking and, in particular, the relationship between architecture and the decorative arts.  Since its foundation in 1884, approximately a third of its members have been architects and five pupils of R N Shaw, including M Macartney and E S Prior were instrumental in setting it up, partly because the RA did not exhibit crafts.  Particularly in matters of restoration, the early members were influenced by the principles of W Morris and the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings.  In the debate that reached a peak in the 1890s over whether architecture was a craft rather than a scientifically based discipline, they were on the former side.  The early members of the Guild, even architects, spent disproportionate time in discussing crafts; in Margaret Richardson’s words, the architects ‘wanted contact with the crafts rather than vice versa’ (p8).  Throughout its history the Guild has sought to further the place of the decorative arts as an integral part of designing buildings and to support training and high standards.  It was most influential on early C20 church architecture and design.  Ironically, having been in the van of progressive thinking in the late C19, the Guild was seen for much of the C20 as a home for conservatives, even reactionaries, especially after the so-called International Style emerged in the 1920s, from which most post-war architecture derived.  However, the widespread reversion in the late C20 to less doctrinaire thinking has given the Guild new life.
Lit: RIBA Gallery (ed R Gradidge): Architects of the Art Workers Guild, 1884-1984, 1984; M Richardson: Architects of  the Arts and Crafts Movement, 1983; NAL Information file

E C Ash
'Edith Clauders Ash' designed a window in Heathfield church that was made in 1917 by Lowndes and Drury, in memory of Lt Col William Claudius Casson Ash (1870-1916), who fell in World War I.  There are three possible candidates in the Ash family with the right name - first, is W C C Ash's aunt, but she married in 1889 and was thus no longer called Ash.  Next is W C C Ash's widow Edith Learoyd Ash (b c1865) and third their daughter Edith C K Ash, who was born in Madras, India in c1899.  'Clauders' is quite likely to be a misreading of 'Claudius', W C C Ash's second name, and the daughter has the right middle initial, so though her actual name is unknown. she is perhaps the most likely, despite her young age in 1917.  A further argument in her favour is the design, which though striking, shows a number of weaknesses that would be consistent with it being the work of a beginner.  The Ash family were prominent locally and successive generations made various donations to the church, both fittings and glass, as well as being musical. 
Glass: Heathfield
(My thanks to Pauline McIldowie of Heathfield, who has provided me with the above information about the Ash family)

A Ashpitel
Arthur Ashpitel (1887-69) was the son of an architect, from whom he received his training.  In 1850 he entered into practice with John Whichcord and together they did extensive work in Kent, including churches.  Later, he reverted to working on his own and wrote extensively on both practical and historical aspects of architecture.  As regards churches, his sympathies lay with the evangelical party, including S S Teulon, with whom on occasion he collaborated.  He made his position clear, even in the 1850s, by his use on occasion of the Perp style.
Lit: DNB
Consulted: Horsham, - St Mary (1865)

A Ayres
Arthur James John Ayres (1902-85) studied sculpture at the RA Schools, where he also taught for some years from 1947.  Much of his work was religious in nature, including the completion of fragmentary statues on the front of Wells cathedral, which was curtailed amid acute controversy in the early 1970s.  His studio was in Hampstead.
Lit: NAL Information file
Sculpture: Barlavington, carving.