Should I refurbish or replace my fixed seating

Imagine coming into your lecture theatre for class, sitting down on worn seats that creak when you tip them with damaged desks impacting your ability to write in your notepad. The alternative is to arrive to a clean, fresh looking lecture room to sit down in comfortable, silent tipping seats and be able to write or type on your desk without any distractions.

Every university, venue, lecturer and student would prefer to enter to the latter lecture hall. So when it comes time to replace your fixed seating, should you choose to replace or simply refurbish? As specialists in manufacturing lecture theatre seating, auditorium seating and seating refurbishment, we’ve provided the pros and cons of each to help you decide.

Advantages of replacing

If your seating is older than 10 years old, it is likely that the seating may need replacing rather than refurbishing.  This means that the environment can be changed to make it more modern.

Replacing your seating can allow you to update rooms to allow modern teaching methods such as flipped or collaborative learning. By replacing the seats, you could install Inova turn and learn seating, bench seating or collaborative bench seating which are better suited to new learning strategies.

Find out more about what flipped classrooms are as well as the advantages and disadvantages of flipped classrooms.

Disadvantages of replacing

Replacing seating can be more expensive than refurbishing; however the room could look completely different once the install has finished making it more a modern and inspiring environment to learn.

Replacing can be seen as less environmentally friendly, but the vast majority of materials that would be disposed of could be used as spare parts or refurbished for another room.

Advantages of refurbishing

Refurbishing seating is the best option when the establishment or company’s policies are to be eco-friendly or environmentally friendly.

Seating refurbishment is usually the cheaper option compared to replacing fixed seating.

The estates departments at universities tend to prefer refurbishing rather than replacing the seating in their lecture rooms due to it being more cost effective and environmentally friendly

Refurbishing is the best option if your damaged seating is in a listed building, which is sometimes the case at universities. We can often refurbish the seating with the same or similar seating fabric to keep the room’s aesthetics.

Seating that has been installed in the last 10 years can be easily repaired and refurbished to make it look as good as new.

Disadvantages of refurbishing

Refurbishing often means that you are restricted in the aesthetic and therefore fabrics or colours that can be used for the seating or desking.