Media 10, the Essex-based publishing and events business, has stopped publication of the print editions of Grand Designs and Good Homes magazines. The December 2024 issues were the last to hit the newsstands.
Karen Stylianides, who edited Grand Designs magazine for seven years, left the company in December.
The titles have not publicly reported their ABC circulation data since the 2019 auditing period, when average circulations per copy stood at 11,945 for Grand Designs and 20,768 for Good Homes across all newsstand sales and subscriptions.
Natalie Keegan, who took over as digital publisher at Media 10 in September 2024, said: “I look after the Grand Designs and Good Homes’ websites at Media 10, we’re still publishing online, despite no longer printing a physical mag.
“Most of our writers are freelance and I do accept pitches. Both websites are updated most days, depending on trends, news, etc. On Grand Designs there are usually two new longer form pieces a week, with smaller news stories or informational pieces throughout. The Good Homes website is updated with smaller articles a little more frequently and there are also about two longer-form articles a week.”
The websites help to drive people to Media 10’s live events. Grand Designs Live and the Ideal Home Show are among its most well-known shows. Media 10 is still publishing print editions of ICON, its quarterly design and architecture title and OnOffice, which focuses on design at work.
Fremantle UK, the TV production company that produces the Grand Designs TV series, declined to comment on whether the Grand Designs print magazine could return in the future.
Founded in May 1998 as a BBC magazine, Good Homes’ peak circulation, achieved the following year, was 151,763. The BBC announced its closure in 2009 amid the great recession and plunging home sales, but the magazine and 17 associated jobs were saved by family-run Kelsey Publishing. Media 10 acquired the title in 2014. Grand Designs magazine was founded by Media 10 in 2004 as a companion product to the television programme and achieved peak sales of around 50,000 per issue.
Last year Media 10 subsidiary Trending Now said it had reached one million total subscriptions across a suite of AI-created B2B newsletters serving 27 industry verticals.
Homes and interiors remain a strong magazine sector with UK titles including: Country Living (ABC sales of 176,507), House and Garden (100,886) and Ideal Home (76,512).
Some freelance editorial contributors to such titles complain that larger publishing groups are increasingly looking to buy all rights to interior shoots and copy so that they can repackage them for their different online and print titles and social media over several years (meaning journalists and photographers making less money than if they resold second rights themselves).
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