Bryant was born to Maria Winship Fox and Gridley Bryant, noted railway pioneer. He studied in his father"s engineering office and that of Alexander Parris, then opened his own architect"s office at the corner of Court and Washington streets.
His work was seen in custom houses, government buildings, churches, schoolhouses, and private residences across the United States. Bryant was a leading proponent of the Boston "Granite Style", and together with Arthur Gilman devised the Back Bay"s gridiron street pattern. Some idea of his popularity as an architect may be had from the fact that 152 buildings that he designed were destroyed in the Boston fire of 1872, and he received commissions to rebuild 110 of them.
Several architects worked with Bryant including Alexander Rice Esty, a church designer, and Edward H. Kendall, later in practice in New New York
His only known commission in the south was Thornbury, a plantation house built in the 1840s for Henry King Burgwyn, in Northampton County, North Carolina.
