Mayfair (magazine)

British adult magazine for men

Mayfair is a British adult magazine for men. Founded in 1966, it was designed as a response to US magazines such as Playboy and Penthouse, the latter of which had recently launched in the UK. For many years, it claimed the largest distribution of any men's magazine in the UK. It is a softcore magazine, and thus is available in newsagents, although some larger retailers require a modesty bag to hide the cover.

Mayfair was launched by Fisk Publishing Ltd in 1966 with an August cover date. The company was controlled by Brian Fisk. Its first editor was David Campbell, and its first deputy editor was Graham Masterton. Its second editor was Woman's Own veteran Kenneth Bound. As well as nudes, Mayfair featured short stories and serious articles on such "male" interests as classic cars, trains, and military history. In its early years, one regular contributor of fiction and nonfiction was American author William S. Burroughs (who became an associate of Masterton's; Masterton later gave Burroughs a posthumous co author credit on his novel Rules of Duel ). A regular feature for many years was Quest, "the laboratory of human response", interviews purportedly with ordinary people (each issue featuring separate conversations with two women and one man, and occasionally couples) about sex matters, and graphic descriptions of sexual encounters. Graham Masterton initially wrote Quest as fiction, but later interviewed real people to inform the article. Another regular feature was a long running cartoon strip featuring the misadventures of Carrie, a nubile blonde who lost her clothes in various embarrassing situations. In 1968, Mayfair took over rival King, which had been launched in 1964, initially with backing from Paul Raymond. The December issue of each year was usually double sized, and featured a "review" of the models seen in previous issues. For many years, this was from the previous year, e. g. the review in Volume 16, Number 12 (December 1981) featured the models seen throughout Volume 15 (January to December 1980). In 1982, a separate and nominally annual Best of Mayfair supplement was introduced, reprinting the full photo sets and other items. This was followed in 1988 by a similar Girls of Summer supplement. In August 1972, Mayfair featured the regular comic strip adventures of "Carrie" with story and fully painted artwork by Don Lawrence. The strip ran for two pages a month for most issues over the next 17 years. Don Lawrence left at the end of 1975, and Mario Capaldi drew the strip from January 1976 to May 1977. In June 1977, Steve Kingston took over. Most of the models featured were "girl next door" types whom the accompanying text claimed to be new to such work. Their pictures would be accompanied by descriptions of their everyday lives and jobs, including that of telephonists, secretaries, shopkeepers, etc. Page 3 girls were also regular features. Some of the early ones would appear full frontal (tabloid papers such as The Sun only featured topless images), but in the late 1980s most such as Samantha Fox and Maria Whittaker would only do topless appearances. Occasionally couples, male and female models and sets of two or more girls together (though lesbianism was usually implied rather than made obvious) were featured. In March 1982, Robert Maxwell reached an agreement to buy Mayfair from Yvonne Fisk (widow of founder Brian). However, Bound persuaded Maxwell to let him mount a management buyout, instead. Many aspects of the magazine changed when, after 24 years as editor, Kenneth Bound agreed to sell the magazine to Paul Raymond Publications. The last issue from Bound/Fisk was Volume 25 Number 1 (January 1990), at which time the magazine had a net paid circulation of 295,646 according to the UK Audit Bureau of Circulations.

The change of ownership and the appointment of Stephen Bleach as editor led to more explicitness, more girl on girl material, and a focus on established models, mostly with large breasted figures. The detailed description of the girls' "everyday lives" gave way to explicit descriptions of their sex lives. The serious content was gradually dropped in favour of an approach more akin to mainstream magazines such as Loaded, while the male interviewees in Quest were dropped in favour of more extreme female only contributions, including lesbianism. Today, Mayfair is published every four weeks along with fellow Paul Raymond adult titles such as Club International, Escort, Men Only, Men's World, and Razzle. Paul Chaplin, also known as Paul Baxendale Walker, acquired ownership of the Paul Raymond Publications titles in August 2012. Mayfair is also sold in digital format. Initially this was via the Paul Raymond digital newsstand from 2013 until that website closed. Subsequently it has been available digitally from the main Paul Raymond website.

In common with many soft core publications, Mayfair was specifically banned in Ireland in 1968, and remained so until successfully appealed along with four other Paul Raymond titles on 21 November 2011. The March 1987 issue featured a model named Tina Reid, stating she had only recently turned 17 when the pictures were taken. When it emerged that she was 15, all copies were withdrawn from UK shops. Nevertheless, Reid later appeared in a number of other glamour magazines (sometimes using the pseudonym of "Trixie Buckingham"), as well as acting under the name Louise Germaine, notably in Dennis Potter's Lipstick on Your Collar and Midnight Movie.