About Albemarle

Back in the early 1960's, Basil Chritchley set the seeds for the birth of what was to become London’s largest and most successful ticket agency. Working from a desk and a telephone in a rented office in Albemarle Street (from which the company took its name), Basil’s personal and individual attention to customers proved to be exactly the right formula for the ongoing success of the business and it is this very same formula that today provides employment for 30 fully trained staff at the company’s headquarters in New Oxford Street in a multi-million pound business headed by Basil’s son, Nicholas.

Basil comes from a theatrical family and has a wealth of knowledge and experience in all aspects of the theatre. Amongst other things, Basil’s father, Arthur, wrote gags for England’s most famous music hall comic, Max Miller (pictured), and completed an exhaustive bike ride from the family home in Hildenborough each week to hand deliver them to Max’s home in Brighton. His brother, Dennis, has successfully penned many professional pantomime scripts which the company has produced over the years.

It is little wonder, then, that Albemarle should branch into other areas of the theatre and today the group includes a highly successful pantomime production office, extensive scenic studios and a comprehensive costume hire department.

After  many years designing and building pantomime scenery which has featured in virtually every major provincial theatre in England, Albemarle took the decision to apply the same skills to the design and construction of sets for stage musicals. In 1997, they built their first set for ‘Me & My Girl’ and ten years on, they now have a portfolio of 19 complete sets with a further two under construction.

Albemarle’s scenic design studios in Shropshire cover over 2,000 square metres of workshop and scenery storage space and are continually expanding. The workshop is equipped with the very best tools and machinery and only top quality materials are used by skilled craftsmen to manufacture scenery to the highest possible standard.