Clift, Christopher, 1861-1933

Christopher Clift was born on June 15, 1861, in Whitley or Whitby, Yorkshire, England. In 1876, he joined the office of Joseph H. Morton, FRIBA, a prominent architect in South Shields, Tyne & Wear, near Newcastle in northern England, and was indentured there for six years, receiving all of his architectural training under Morton's supervision. In 1882, he emigrated to Canada and settled in Montreal, where he was invited to form a partnership with James A. Nelson in 1883 (Nelson & Clift). He collaborated with him until December 1890 and later he opened his own office in Montreal in early 1891. In 1894, he formed a new partnership with Morley Pope, and together they operated two offices, one in Sherbrooke, Quebec where Clift moved in 1896, and one in Montreal, supervised by Pope. Clift was one of the founding members of the Province of Quebec Association of Architects and served as its Secretary in 1890.

In May 1900, Clift left Canada and moved to Schenectady, New York. where he opened a new office under his own name. In 1908, he moved to New York City and remained there for nearly ten years, and took a position with the Atlantic Terra Cotta Co., supervising the installation of the elaborate cladding system on the Woolworth Building (built 1911-13), an early skyscraper landmark designed by Cass Gilbert and, at the time of its completion, described as the tallest building in the world. In 1918, he moved to Wilmington, Delaware where he held the position of company architect for the DuPont Engineering Co., acting as designer, draftsman, and specification writer, overseeing nearly $15 million in new buildings for the General Motors Corporation which were built at Pontiac and Flint, Michigan, and at Oshawa, Ontario. These buildings included auto paint shops, assembly and machine shops, loading and storage buildings, and power house plants. He also advised on planning the company housing estates at Pontiac and Flint, Michigan, and assisted with the planning and development of the new town of Hadley Bend, Tennessee, site of the Old Hickory Powder Plant where he designed the YMCA, the YWCA, community houses, and housing estates for employees at the plant.

In 1885, he married Maria Jane Boag. He died on September 6, 1933, in Wilmington, Delaware.