The developer was Jonathan Carr (brother of J. Comyns Carr), who in 1875 bought of land just north of Turnham Green Station in West London which had been constructed six years earlier. The City of London was only 30 minutes by steam train and the site was blessed with many fine trees. The desire to protect the mature trees led to the informal plan that is major feature of Bedford Park. The first architect for the estate was Edward William Godwin, a leading member of the Aesthetic Movement, but his plans came in for some criticism in The Builder, the leading professional journal of its day, and Godwin and Carr parted company. Some designs were commissioned from the firm of Coe and Robinson, but in 1877 Carr hired Richard Norman Shaw the leading architect of his day to be the Estate architect. By then the layout of the Park had been set but Shaw's house designs, in the Queen Anne style, proved remarkably successful in creating an impression of great variety whilst employing a limited number of house types.