Recently, several people have asked us when the newspaper library at Colindale will be closing and the print newspapers moving to Boston Spa. In June, the British Library confirmed that the Colindale site in North London will close on Friday 8 November 2013.

As many of you will already know, the content on the BNA website comes from the British Library’s amazing newspaper collection at Colindale – which contains over 750 million pages from local, regional and national newspapers, as well as periodicals. But in order to safeguard the long-term future of the physical collection, the paper newspapers will be moving to a purpose-built Newspaper Storage Building (NSB) in Boston Spa, West Yorkshire. The NSB is one of the most remarkable library buildings in the world, and holding the newspapers here will ensure they are preserved for future generations.

From March 2014, the newspaper readers who previously used Colindale will be able to visit a dedicated newspaper Reading Room at the Library’s main site at St Pancras, where microfilm and digital copies will be available. If there is no digital or microfilm version of a specific newspaper, then in most cases it will be possible to request the original print version of the newspaper, providing it is in suitable condition for travel – these print versions will be delivered to St Pancras within 48 hours. As for the BNA, the scanning team will continue to digitise pages from the BL’s newspaper collection, so the website will continue to grow despite the shift in location of the newspapers.

You can read full details about the closure of Colindale at the British Library’s Newspaper Moves web page.

The photograph of Colindale appears courtesy of The British Library Board.