He came from a landowning family, the Orpens of Stillorgan, County Dublin, and became a successful architect. A friend of Percy French, he performed in French's entertainments, including live sketching, recitations, and a comic lecture accompanied by magic lantern slides, illustrated covers for French's comic songs, and was chief cartoonist of French's comic magazine The Jarvey. He wrote and illustrated The Comic Irish Alphabet for the Present Time, published by Young Ireland & Co.