Robert Smail's Printing Works

The Robert Smail's Printing Works in Innerleithen was established as a jobbing printer in 1866. The property includes a fully operational letterpress Printing Works (Paper Store, Case Room and Machine Room), the original Office and a Gift Shop. It was taken over by the National Trust for Scotland in 1986 when Cowan Smail retired and opened to the public in 1990.

Cowan Smail was the third generation of the family which had owned the firm for 120 years. During that time, Smail's carried out print jobs for the whole community and they published a weekly newspaper, The St. Ronan's Standard and Effective Advertiser, from 1893-1916.

The Smails were serious hoarders and because of this, there are job dockets, invoices, wages books and ledgers dating back to the start of the business, stacked on shelves in the office. The archive includes 52 original guardbooks which contain a copy of every job printed at the Works for nearly a century.

The Case Room is filled with rack after rack of different typefaces. Here everything was carefully set by hand - and still is! - for Smail's made little attempt to enter the twentieth  century. 

During our visit to the Printing Works, we were given the opportunity to try handsetting for ourselves. This was quite hard as we had to read and spell upside down to ensure it would print correctly.

I found it particularly interesting that the "j" and "u" came after the "x y z" in the cases because they used to use "i's" for "j's" and "v's" for "u's".  We also learnt where "Uppercase" and "Lowercase" get their names from - It is because of the position that the respective type-cases are in - e.g. the capital letters are kept in the upper-case and the small letters in the lower-case.

The Uppercase and Lowercase

In the Machine Room we saw the presses in action including a treadle-operated Arab Platen, much larger Wharfedale Reliance (bought in the late 1800s) and the Hiedelberg Platen. When the presses were in action we saw the old belt and pulley system, which dates back to when Smail's ran on waterpower.


The Hiedelberg Platen

Smail's is still very much part of the town of Innerleithen. It is still producing printing work, using the original Victorian letterpress techniques and machinery.

I really enjoyed this trip and would definitely recommend it for a place to visit.