Bath Press development site brought to market by Savills

By Peter Davison

19 June 2023

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The Bath Press building

A significant residential-led mixed use development site at the former Bath Press premises in Bath has been brought to the market by Savills.

The site is located in a transformational part of the city on Lower Bristol Road, to the west of the city centre, within the World Heritage Site boundary and Bath City Riverside Enterprise Area.

Extending to approximately 1.14 hectares (5.3 acres) the site has resolution to grant planning permission for a development of 277 high-quality dwellings.

The scheme proposes a mix of 247 apartments and 30 townhouses, alongside 1,505 sq. m. (16,200 sq. ft) of ground floor office space fronting Lower Bristol Road.

The site, which has been vacant since 2007, was originally home to the Pitman Press, founded by Sir Isaac Pitman in 1889.

Pitman devised a system of shorthand and by 1874 was an established editor, printer and publisher on an industrial scale.

While many of the buildings were demolished under a previous consent, the frontage of the original printworks, which is locally listed, has been preserved, together with the original chimney.

The proposed development, designed by architects, CDA, and landscape architects, Macgregor Smith, incorporates the historic elements with contemporary architecture, proposing high quality materials throughout.

The apartments, which have been designed in conjunction with a Build to Rent (BtR) operator, encompass one, two and three bedroom units, which are principally four storeys, with an additional storey on three of the blocks.

The original façade and chimney will be incorporated into the apartment scheme, with the proposals including a private roof terrace around the main chimney.

The masterplan for the scheme also incorporates a further two roof terraces and three landscaped areas, including a playground. It also provides 122 car parking spaces and cycle stores with capacity for 596 spaces across the site.

Ben Taylor, a director in Savills development team in Bristol, said: "We are delighted to be offering the former Bath Press site to the market. Sites of this nature and scale are exceptionally rare in Bath and, even more so, those with detailed planning permission.’

The site is offered for sale by informal tender on a freehold basis with vacant possession. Savills is inviting unconditional offers by noon on Wednesday, July 5.

By Peter Davison

Peter Davison is deputy editor of The Business Magazine. He has spent his life in journalism – doing work experience in newsrooms in and around Bristol while still at school, and landing his first job on a local newspaper aged 19. By 28 he was the youngest newspaper editor in the country.

An early advocate of online news, he spent the first years of the 2000s telling his bosses that the internet posed both the biggest opportunity and greatest threat to the newspaper industry and the art of journalism. He was right on both counts.

Since 2006 he has enjoyed a career as a freelance journalist. He lives in rural Wiltshire with one wife, two children, and three cats.