Clifford Ewart Culpin was born in Biggleswade, Bedfordshire, England on 15 July 1904. he was the son of the architect Ewart Gladstone Culpin (1877-1946). It is not kbnown where or with whom he received his training as an architect. It may have been with his father. He was elected an Associate of the Royal Institute of British Architects (ARIBA) in 1929. In 1935 he joined his father in partnership as Ewart Culpin & Son.
From its inception the practice specialised in town planning and housing. This developed into a wider range of commissions including schools, churches, shopping centres, banks, bus garages, leisure and health facilities, libraries, fire and police stations, magistrates courts, laboratories, and various other building types.
Notable among their projects from the 1930s was the design of Greenwich Town Hall in Greenwich, London, competed in 1939. A photograph of the committee room of Greenwich Town Hall designed by the practice is illustrated in 'Decorative Art' 1941 (p.62).
Ewart Culpin & Son was subsequently renamed Culpin Limited. Later projects by the firm have included master plan and some neighbourhood areas in the new village at Martlesham Heath; expansion of housing at Port Stanley, Falkland Islands; sheltered housing, frail elderly housing and housing for special needs with warden accommodation for various local authority and housing association clients; shared ownership and housing for rent for housing associations; rehabilitation and refurbishment of high-rise flats, some with tenants in occupation; estate master planning, layouts and house-type development for national house builders; PFI estate layout and house-type development; local authority housing estate upgrading, including an estate- wide video surveillance network. restoration and refurbishment projects include work to listed buildings and in conservation areas such as the headquarters of the Royal College of Nursing in Cavendish Square, the King's Observatory in Kew, work in the Palace of Westminster and the German Ambassador's Residence in Belgrave Square.
Clifford Ewart Culpin died in Oxford, Oxfordshire on 8 October 1988