WORK can begin next month on a new £1.2m pub development in Darlington after magistrates gave the scheme the go-ahead.

The JD Wetherspoon pub chain will undertake a major redevelopment of buildings on Crown Street to form a new bar, which will be due to open at the beginning of March next year.

Named The Printworks, the pub will be a conversion of the former supermarket and warehouse which back on to the Cornmill Shopping Centre and have remained empty for the past two years.

However, the adjacent former furnishing shop will remain on the market and is not included in the scheme.

The new pub is named after the former Dressers works which occupied the building and was a printing arm of the Dressers stationers which was a feature of High Row for more than 100 years.

In the 1890s, the firm moved its presses to Crown Street and it was eventually sold to the owners of The Northern Echo in the Twenties with printing continuing there until 1963.

The new pub will create 35 full and part-time jobs, and will be Wetherspoon's second pub in the town, along with The Tanners Hall in Skinnergate.

Unlike that pub, however, The Printworks will play music and show music videos.

Approximately one third of the building will be designated as non-smoking and the building will be wheelchair accessible.

Last Wednesday's decision by South Durham Magistrates Court, sitting in Darlington, follows planning permission already granted by Darlington Borough Council.

Although the redevelopment will not involve a razing of the building, a spokesman for the chain said it would look totally different.

Wetherspoon managing director John Hutson said: "We are delighted to have been granted a licence to open a new outlet in Darlington."

The buildings were bought up by the owners of the Cornmill Centre last year, the Rachel Charitable Trust, which is also preparing to develop the car park opposite the pub development, adding a new tier of parking.