The original Executive Committee consisted of Lieutenant General the Hon. Charles Grey, Sir Charles B. Phipps, Sir Charles Eastlake, Sir Alexander Y. Spearman, Sir Thomas Myddelton Biddulph, and Mr. Doyne C. Bell. The trustees appointed by Her Majesty were the Right Honorable George Lord Viscount Torrington, the Honorable Sir Charles Beaumont Phipps, Sir Alexander Young Phipps, and William Cubitt, Esq., Lord Mayor of London at the time of the first proposal for erecting the monument.
Out of various beautiful designs submitted by Sir Gilbert Scott, Sir James Pennethorne, Thomas L. Donaldson, P. C. Hardwick, Sir M. Digby Wyatt, and C. and E. M. Barry, Sir Gilbert Scott's design was chosen, and was created under his supervision by John Kelk, who generously undertook the erection of the monument without any profit whatever.
Sir Gilbert Scott had this to say about his design: "My idea in designing the Memorial was to erect a kind of ciborium to protect a statue of the Prince; and its special characteristic was that the ciborium was designed in some degree on the principles of the ancient shrines. These shrines were models of imaginary buildings, such as had never in reality been erected; and my idea was to realise one of these imaginary structures with its precious materials, its inlaying, its enamels, etc. etc."