Peter Hickmott, a fitter and turner by trade, needed a pull handle for his front door, but couldn’t find exactly what he had envisioned, so decided to engineer his own.

He approached Smith City Market for feedback and they commended his efforts, but their real need was brass cabinet knobs. Peter agreed to meet their request and the first Windsor Brass order was placed.

1980s

During late nights and early mornings, Peter tirelessly crafted the cabinet knobs in a backyard garage utilising a friend’s lathe. Expanding to D cabinet handles, he then began to secure joiner customers in Christchurch and Auckland.

By 1986, a pivotal order led him to resign from his day job at CWF Hamilton’s, fully committing to Windsor Brass.

After extensive research and experimentation in 20L buckets we created our first special finish, Antique Bronze.

Two years later he transitioned from the home garage to our inaugural industrial premises, hired our first employee and launched our first range.

1990s

Windsor began importing superior brass enabling the ability to offer a full suite of architectural hardware.

Faced with increasing demand, in 1991 Windsor moved to a larger premises employing further staff and established a sales team.

Two years later Peter and Rose Hickmott relocated the business to Invercargill.

2000s

2003 was a pivotal moment where we introduced our first volume builder and Brushed Nickel range, Astron.

This expedited significant growth by entering a new market, continuing to expand our range and customer base, resulting in our third rebrand.

2010s

With a workforce of 20 employees geared for expansion, we moved into our current purpose-built facility.

Our finish offering grew including our signature hand finishes, but this decade also saw the introduction of the popular Matt Black and Graphite Nickel finishes.

The brand evolved from Windsor Brass to Windsor Architectural Hardware incorporating our extensive product range and market offering.

2020s

Our team structure underwent a significant change bringing new expertise in-house including global sales, marketing, IT, HR and accounting.

This laid the foundations to expand to Australia and in 2022 we employed our first Australian sales rep.

Exceptional customer service and quality products has always been at the core of what we do, and we’d like to thank our loyal customers for trusting in Windsor for the past 40 years!