Portal:Trains/Selected article/Week 25, 2012

Edmund Sharpe (31 October 1809 – 8 May 1877) was an English architect, architectural historian, railway engineer, and sanitary reformer. In 1835 he established an architectural practice in Lancaster, initially working on his own. In 1845 he entered into partnership with Edward Paley, one of his pupils. Sharpe's main focus was on churches, and he was a pioneer in the use of terracotta as a structural material in church building, designing what were known as "pot" churches. He also designed secular buildings, including domestic properties and schools, and worked on the development of railways in Northwest England, designing bridges and planning new lines. In 1851 he resigned from his architectural practice, and in 1856 he moved from Lancaster, spending the remainder of his career mainly as a railway engineer, first in North Wales, then in Switzerland and southern France. Sharpe returned to England in 1866 to live in Scotforth near Lancaster, where he designed a final church near to his home. Sharpe achieved national recognition as an architectural historian. He published books of detailed architectural drawings, wrote a number of articles on architecture, devised a scheme for the classification of English Gothic architectural styles, and in 1875 was awarded the Royal Gold Medal of the Royal Institute of British Architects. Towards the end of his career Sharpe organised expeditions to study and draw buildings in England and France. While on such an expedition to Italy in 1877, he was taken ill and died. His body was taken to Lancaster, where he was buried. Sharpe's legacy consists of about 40 extant churches; railway features, including the Conwy Valley Line and bridges on what is now the Lancashire section of the West Coast Main Line; and his archive of architectural books, articles and drawings.