The move was announced ahead of the group’s AGM today, along with the news that non-executive chairman Miles Emley will step down next summer at its financial year-end.

Emley joined the company 18 years ago and is the last remaining member of the senior management team hand-picked by founder Lord Gavron.

He will be replaced by Richard Stillwell, a former executive vice president at ICI who has been a non-executive director at St Ives for the past four years.

The plc will take an entire floor at the One Tudor Street (www.onetudorstreet.com) development close to Fleet Street. It expects to complete its move to the new facility in March.

In its interim management statement released today (30 November), St Ives said that its latest acquisition Occam had been successfully integrated into the group. Activity in point-of-sale was described as "strong" while books continues to do well.

However, there is still downward price pressure in its magazines business; while margins in exhibitions and events, and in commercial print, have suffered some short-term impact due to restructuring costs.

The exhibition business is being relocated to Chessington, and the closure of the Edenbridge factory involved moving one of its web presses to Peterborough, leading to a short-term increase in outwork costs.

Despite this, and the fact that it described visibility in its markets as "poor", St Ives said it was confident of making further progress in the current financial year.

The group remains on the lookout for value-adding acquisitions, and now has an additional £6.3m in cash in its war chest to fund potential buys.

St Ives' share price was unchanged at 99p at the time of writing.