Gustav Wilhelm Wolff was born on 14 November 1834 in Hamburg to Moritz Wolff, a merchant and his wife, Fanny Schwabe. Gustav was brought up in the Lutheran Church as his family had converted from Judaism in 1819. In March 1850 aged 15, Wolff left Hamburg to live in Liverpool with his uncle, Gustav Christian Schwabe, a financier. Wolff was educated at Liverpool College; afterwards he served an apprenticeship at the engineers Joseph Whitworth and Company, in Manchester. The firm considered Wolff so able that he was chosen to represent the company at the 1855 Paris Exhibition. After serving his apprenticeship, Wolff was employed by the B. Goodfellow Ltd., a firm based in Hyde, Greater Manchester as a draughtsman. In 1857, due to the intervention of his uncle Gustav Christian Schwabe, Wolff was employed as Edward Harland's personal assistant at Robert Hickson's shipyard at Queen's Island, Belfast. In 1860, Edward Harland recruited Wolff as his business partner, and Harland and Wolff was formed.