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from humble beginnings to international achievements

a Few Words About K&s

Alastair, William & Andrew Simpson at St. Ann's Warehouse installing the Portobello Stacking Theatre Chair
Alastair, William and Andrew at St. Ann's Warehouse, NYC

expertise spanning decades

We know that our clients are the key to our success. triumph.

In 1945, Kirwin & Simpson was founded by Bernard Simpson after a lunchtime conversation with the local cinema manager.

During the Second World War, Bernard had been running a factory which was commandeered for the war effort to make GI-parachutes. During this conversation, the manager lamented how the cinema's seats were in a terrible state, and due to rationing efforts, there wasn’t any fabric available to repair them. Bernard then mentioned that with a bit of enterprise the small parachute off-cuts could be sewn together and used to upholster the chairs. And soon, those old canvas bags were cut up and used to recover the dilapidated seats at the local cinema.

Without our clients we could never have grown throughout the UK or venture globally.

who we are

We help you solve problems

Kirwin & Simpson are a fourth-generation family business which has been providing a first-class design, installation, and repair service to the UK entertainment industry for over 75 years. We were founded in 1945 and have since built a reputation on ensuring that clients’ quality and design requirements are met and exceeded.

Although we are the premier UK Theatre Seating Supplier today, Kirwin & Simpson started from much humbler beginnings as local reupholsterers after World War II. 

Since our earliest beginnings, we have continually strived to improve our products and our service, and we’re still learning from experience. This underpins our ability to devise and provide solutions to the problems encountered by architects and designers specifying new auditoria, or managers trying to minimise disruption to busy production schedules.

Our ability to supply and maintain high quality auditorium seating to the most stringent requirements and respond quickly and positively to urgent briefs means companies from fields as diverse as entertainment, education and transport can count on us to get results. 

Our clients know that we can deliver on their individual requirements, which is why we continue to have long-standing relationships with so many important venues and organisations. We believe this is one of the main reasons for the company’s enduring success.

We are proud to count virtually all of London’s West End theatres as clients, as well as a large and diverse client base from the cinema industry and other sectors throughout the UK, Europe, North America and Australia.

Four generations of simpsons

We the Team

Expertise spanning generations.
Joint Managing Director

Andrew Simpson

Joint Managing Director

Alastair Simpson

William Simpson - Kirwin & Simpson Seating Sales Director
Sales Director

William Simpson

Finance Director

Alexander Simpson

Administrative Director

Joanne Simpson

Business & Development

Ian Moore

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