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If you have been checking out our Isabella Josie shop, either online or in person, you may have noticed that our millinery studio / hat shop is inside The Old Print Works Shopping Arcade. Our artisan arcade is a bit of a hidden gem, full of a vibrant community of specialist independent and unique shops and businesses.
Would you like to find out more about the history of our Arundel hat home and its arcade?
The Old Printing Works Shopping Arcade is housed within Arundel’s Victorian printing rooms where The West Sussex Gazette, Sussex’s oldest regional newspaper, was published for over 150 years. The first edition of The West Sussex Gazette newspaper was published in 1853 and was known as ’Mitchells Monthly Advertiser and West Sussex Market and Railway Intelligencer’. The monthly publication was packed, as the name suggests, with advertisements alongside the railway timetable.
Over the coming years the newspaper changed its name several times, grew in size, content and frequency, with an increasing number of editorial pages. By 1854 the publication was being printed on a weekly basis and was one of the biggest employers in the town.
The original copies of the paper were type set and hand printed on a large Eagle Hand Press. Each letter was carefully placed by hand, back to front to form a word which could then be printed - the press had the capacity of printing 800 copies a day. Letter mould advances with the 1886 invention of the Linotype, an automated compositioning machine, enabled type to be set faster and together with improvements in printing presses enabled up to 9,000 copies to be printed each hour.
The newspaper’s front office was located at 53 The High Street, with its long printing rooms, where the newspaper printing machinery was housed, running behind the main front office, parallel to Tarrant Street.
On 18th March 1889 a fire broke out. The fire was so ferocious that it turned the printing machinery into twisted and molten metal and enforced the acquisition of better machinery. Although the front offices of the building were saved from the fire, just 10 years later, due to the successful growth of the paper, the offices were replaced with the Jacobean style / Sussex half timber work that still stands today. The new building received national recognition and was described by The British Architect as “the most artistic county newspaper office … in England.” More recently, the building also received a blue plaque to marks its 150th anniversary.
Over the coming years, changes continued. In 1907 the rotary press was introduced enabling the size of printing paper to increase and in 1960’s computers further revolutionised the printing rooms.
The West Sussex Gazette was a family owned business and has been passed from generation to generation through the Mitchell family. It was initially founded by Thomas Henry Mitchell in 1853 as an outlet for his son, William Woods Mitchell. Although still owned and printed by the Mitchell family, in 1924 the business became a limited company (Mitchell & Co. (Printer) Limited) and in 1953 was acquired by the Portsmouth and Sunderland Newspaper Group.
In 1969, with the development of colour printing machines and the offset lithographic process, the newspaper's printing rooms transferred from Arundel to Portsmouth. The Arundel site continued as a jobbing printers until the early 70's. During 1996, a decision was made to also move the editorial and office staff to Chichester. The West Sussex Gazette is still in print today.
In the 1980’s the old printing rooms that lay behind the high street building were converted into flats and a shopping arcade. In 2000 the shopping arcade was updated with items salvaged from St James parish church in Croydon.
Today, The Old Print Works Shopping Arcade has two entrances, both which can be found on Tarrant Street. If you are coming to find our little hat shop, do take your time to check out the printing house's structure and some of those salvaged items. Please do pop into to our neighbouring business too - you never know what you might find!
If you would like further information on the printing rooms and to see some of the equipment, pop into Arundel Museum or join one of Arundel's walking tours.
Copyright and article accuracies: If you would like to share any further information about the history of The Old Printing House please do contact me. With thanks to West Sussex Library Service and our local Arundel historians (you know who you are!) for the information you have kindly shared. Historic images have previously been printed and shared by several sources, including The West Sussex Gazette, photos of the current day are my own.
