Gilbert Mackenzie Trench [also known as G. Mackenzie Trench] was born in Camberwell [or East Dulwich*], Surrey, England on 4 April 1885 and was articled to Thomas Arnold (1838-1912) in 1901-02, and to Augustine Scott Alban Hamilton (1878-1944) of Scott & Hanson in London from 1902 to 1905. He then worked as an assistant to Rowland Plumbe (1838-1919) in London from 1905 to 1907. He qualified as an architect in 1907 and in 1908-09 was employed as Managing Assistant to Frederick G. Cooke (1858-1938). In 1909 he was appointed an assistant in H.M. Office of Works, and from 1911 to 1918 was Assistant Assessment Architect and Surveyor in H.M. Office of Works. In 1920 he was appointed Deputy-Surveyor to the Metropolitan Police, succeeding J. Dixon Butler, and later that year was appointed Police Architect and Surveyor.
Trench was elected an Associate of the Royal Institute of British Architects (ARIBA) in 1908 and a Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects (FRIBA) in 1925. In 1929 he was awarded the Order of the British Empire (O.B.E.) for his invention of the police box.
During World War One he served in the Seaforth Highlanders and Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders.
His address was given as 50 Marmora Road, East Dulwich, South East London in 1911; 18 Eastfield Drive, Aigburth Road. Liverpool in 1913; 59 Marmora Road, Honor Oak, South East London in 1920; and Glen Morven, The Glade, Reigate, Surrey in 1931 and 1935. By 1961 Trench had moved to New Zealand and had settled in Manawatu-Wanganui, where he died on 14 August 1979.
* His place of birth is given as East Dulwich in the 1901 England and Wales Census and Camberwell in the 1911 England & Wales Census.
Residences in Highbury, London and Eastbourne, East Sussex; factories in Clerkenwell and Chiswick, London; and, while with H. Office of Works, many public buildings In the North of England, and Police Buildings In the London.
In 1928 Trench designed a new police box for the Metropolitan Police. The blue box was subsequently immortalised when it was used as a time-travelling machine [The Tardis] in the British television series Dr Who.
Directory of British Architects 1834-1914. Compiled by Antonia Brodie, et al. Volume 2: L-Z. London; New York: British Architectural Library, Royal Institute of British Architects/Continuum, 2001
'Elystan Street, Chelsea' in Flats: Municipal and Private Enterprise. London: Ascot Gas Water Heaters Ltd., 1938 pp. 120-125. [Police flats designed by G. Mackenzie Trench in 1934-37]
‘Juvenile court, Blackfriars Road’. Architecture Illustrated July 1940 p.99 [Architect: G. Mackenzie Trench]
Long, Nicholas. ‘Metropolitan police stations, 1920-1974’. Twentieth Century Architecture no. 13, 2018, pp. 96-113.
‘Police station and section house, Tooting’. Architect & Building News 30 June 1939 pp. 381-384 [Architect: G. Mackenzie Trench]
‘Metropolitan Police Section House, Compton Place, London WC1’. Architects' Journal 13 April 1939 pp. 604-609 [Architects: G. Mackenzie Trench, D. T. Edwards, and A. L. Edwards]
‘Metropolitan Police Sectional Station, Hayes’. Architectural Design October 1938 p. 410 [Architect: G. Mackenzie Trench]
‘Metropolitan Police Section House, Kennington Lane, SE1’. Architectural Design October 1938 p. 409 [Architect: G. Mackenzie Trench]
‘Police station and section house, Tooting’. Architects’ Journal 7 September 1939 pp. 329-333 [Architect: G. Mackenzie Trench]
‘Police station-air raid and gas-proofed-in Tottenham Court Road’. Architect & Building News 5 February 1943 p. 115 [Architect: G. Mackenzie Trench]
‘Brixton police station’. Architecture Illustrated May 1940 pp. 73-74 [Architect: G. Mackenzie Trench]
‘Police station, Catford’. Architect & Building News 5 April 1940 pp. 12-13 [Architect: G. Mackenzie Trench]
‘Police station, Southall, Middlesex’. Architect & Building News 7 December 1928 p. 735 [Architects: G. Mackenzie Trench and C. A. Battle]
‘Police station, Southwark’. Architect & Building News 20 June 1941 p. 161 [Architect: G. Mackenzie Trench]
‘Police station, Southwark’. Architecture Illustrated July 1941 p.94 [Architect: G. Mackenzie Trench]
‘Police station, Southwark’. Building June 1941 p. 146[Architect: G. Mackenzie Trench]
‘Police station, Tottenham Court Road, with honeycomb windows or brick gratings to enable work to continue during enemy action’. The Builder 25 December 1942 p. 549 [Designed by G. Mackenzie Trench]
‘Police wireless transmitting station, West Wickham'. Architect & Building News 20 August 1937 pp. 228-229 [Architect: G. Mackenzie Trench]
‘Police wireless transmitting station, West Wickham’. Architects' Journal 26 August 1937 pp. 345-348 [Architect: G. Mackenzie Trench]