 He became the pupil of architect Benjamin Ferrey (1810–80) in 1846.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.Ferrey's association with Pugin had a profound effect upon Norton, who adopted Pugin's principles and Christian moral dimensions in his own subsequent designs for church architecture.