Write for Us
Guest posts, sponsored articles and how to pitch
Write for Picnic Magazine
Picnic is a lifestyle magazine about the places we go, the things we eat and the way we live. We publish travel features, food and drink writing, design and interiors, wellness and outdoor living, with a bias towards slow, well-observed stories over listicles. Much of what we run comes from freelance writers and photographers, and we are always looking for new voices. This page is our contributor guidelines and our invitation to write for us.
What we publish
- Travel: destination features, weekend guides, slow travel, hotels and rentals worth the detour, and practical planning pieces.
- Food and drink: recipes with a story behind them, restaurant and producer profiles, picnic and outdoor cooking, wine, coffee and spirits.
- Outdoor living: hiking, camping, gardens, seasonal guides and the gear that actually earns its place in the bag.
- Design and home: interiors, architecture, craft, sustainable materials and the objects people keep for decades.
- Wellness and culture: rituals and routines, books, music, exhibitions and the small habits that shape a good day.
Guest posts and sponsored articles
We accept guest posts from writers, photographers, chefs, designers, guides and makers with first-hand knowledge of their subject. We also accept sponsored posts from hotels, tour operators, food and drink brands, homeware and outdoor companies and other businesses whose products or places belong in a lifestyle magazine. A sponsored post is a paid placement, written to the same editorial standard, and labelled as sponsored where disclosure is required.
Every article we publish is permanent and indexed, and stays in our archive alongside the rest of the magazine. Links within the body of an article are dofollow when they point to something a reader would genuinely want to visit: a hotel, a recipe source, a maker's shop, a trail map. Pricing for sponsored placements is available on request. Once a draft is approved, the typical turnaround to a live page is three to five working days.
Guidelines
- Original work only. We check every submission and decline anything already published, including on personal blogs and social media.
- 800 words minimum. Our most-read features run between 1,200 and 2,000 words, with a clear opening, real detail and an ending that lands.
- One or two relevant links. They should serve the reader, not the writer. Affiliate cloaking and link-only paragraphs are removed.
- Photography is part of the story. Send your own images or properly licensed ones, at least 1,600px wide, with credits and alt text.
- No gambling, adult or pharmaceutical content, and no pieces that read as a press release.
- An author bio is optional. Two sentences and one link if you include one.
- We edit for house style, clarity and length, and we may change the headline. Substantial edits are sent back to you before publication.
Formats: a Google Doc link, a Word document or clean HTML, with images in a shared folder.
How to pitch
Email guestpost@picnicmagazine.net with the subject line "Guest post: <topic>". Tell us the working title, the angle in three sentences, where you have been published before and whether you can supply images. Finished drafts are welcome. If you are asking about a sponsored post, say so in the first line and we will reply with current pricing and availability.
We answer every pitch, usually within two working days, and we are honest when a story is not right for us so you can place it elsewhere.
Anything else about how to submit an article can go to guestpost@picnicmagazine.net.