Crace was the eldest of eleven surviving children of
John Gregory Crace (1809–1889), interior decorator and author, and his wife, Sarah Jane Hine Langley (1815–1894), the daughter of John Inwood Langley (1790–1874) of
Greenwich, a civil servant at the
Royal Naval Hospital. His father was renowned as a decorator who was in partnership for eight years with
A.W.N. Pugin, the eminent Gothic revival architect, and was head of a decorating firm founded in 1768 by his great-great-grandfather Edward Crace, a coach-decorator and keeper of the king's pictures. Edward and his son Frederick were responsible for the decoration of
Brighton Pavilion and other Royal palaces. Crace came to fame with his
Victorian Gothic and
Renaissance-style furniture which he exhibited at the International Exhibition in 1862. Crace decorated the interior of
Two Temple Place,
William Waldorf Astor's London estate office, in the style of French Renaissance from about 1892 to 1895. For Astor, he also designed furniture and decorated the home in Cliveden. He similarly redecorated
Longleat for
John Thynne, 4th Marquess of Bath. Crace decorated the Royal Academy's Fine Rooms, but a painting by
William Kent lies beneath his work. He is buried with others of the Crace dynasty at
West Norwood Cemetery. ==Works in museums and galleries==