PR for Interior Designers: How to Get Your Projects Published
PR for an interior designer mostly means one thing: getting a finished project published. Every design publication has its own submission route and rules, and the rule that trips designers up most is exclusivity, because most titles only take projects that have not appeared anywhere else. Below: the step-by-step, where to submit and what each title asks for (from their own pages, checked 23 September 2026), a pitch you can adapt, the awards worth entering, and when a publicist is worth paying.
Pick one finished, professionally photographed project that has never been published, Instagram included. Submit it to one title at a time through its own route, best fit first. Build up with regional titles, Houzz and design blogs.
Top of the list: Architectural Digest takes PDFs at [email protected], subject "PROJECT SUBMISSION", and replies only if interested, within 90 days.
Most accessible: Houzz editorial and Dwell, which says it replies within five business days if interested.
The rule to plan around: exclusivity.
We checked the six interior design PR firms that rank on Google for this search (23 September 2026). Two publish a price: retainers from $4,500 and $6,000 a month, each with a six-month minimum.
Cheapest published option: a single home-tour placement for a $5,000 flat fee.
Four of six publish no price, and none of their contact forms has a budget field.
Doing it yourself: every submission route in this guide is free.
Step by step
- Choose the project. Finished, recent (Luxe asks for work completed in the last one to two years; Houzz looks for the past year), and with a story: a problem solved, an unusual client brief, a signature detail.
- Keep it unpublished. No full reveal on Instagram or your own portfolio yet. Most titles below refuse work that has appeared elsewhere.
- Get professional photography and the homeowner's permission to publish, and ask whether they would allow a reshoot if a magazine wants its own photographer.
- Rank your target titles by fit and prestige, using the table below.
- Submit to the first one only, by its own route and rules. Wait for its stated response window.
- If it passes, move to the next. Once a title has published the project, pitch it to outlets that accept previously published work, and share it everywhere.
What to have ready
- Professional photography. Interior Design magazine asks for .jpg or .tiff at 350 dpi or more; Houzz looks for images at least 2,400 px wide. Casual phone photos are fine for a first pitch only at Dwell.
- Plans and drawings where the title asks for them (Interior Design wants floor plans and renderings with measurements).
- Full credits: architect, builder, garden designer, photographer, key makers and sources.
- A short proposal: Luxe's guide asks for who, what scope, where, when, how and why, in a few lines.
- Budget information if you are pitching Houzz or Dwell's cost-breakdown series.
Where to submit, and their rules
| Publication | How to submit | Key rules (from their own pages) |
|---|---|---|
| Architectural Digest | PDF to [email protected], subject "PROJECT SUBMISSION" | No work published elsewhere, print or digital. Replies only if accepted, within 90 days. No unsolicited articles. |
| House Beautiful | [email protected] for home tours | No specs or response time published. Separate nominations address for its Next Wave list. |
| Luxe Interiors + Design | Regional pitch form on its contact page; Home Submission Guide PDF | Requires exclusivity (never published in a magazine). Designer must be based in a Luxe region. Completed in the last 1-2 years, not on the market, not already featured on social media. |
| Interior Design magazine | Submittable form on its editorial submissions page | 350 dpi+ professional photos, floor plans and renderings. Must not have run as a magazine feature in the US or Canada; news mentions are fine. |
| Dwell | [email protected] with a short description and images | Say where else it has appeared. Replies within five business days if interested. Contracts include a period of exclusivity. Print needs four months' lead time. |
| Apartment Therapy | House Tour form | Emails only the people it chooses. |
| Design Milk | Form on its submit page | Reviews everything, cannot reply to each submission. |
| Houzz (editorial) | Upload the project to your Houzz profile, then email the link to [email protected] | Projects from the past year, photos 2,400 px+ wide, before-and-after shots, budget details. |
Elle Decor and Veranda list no project-submission route on their contact pages that we could find, and we could not confirm a current route for Domino. For those, the path is usually through an editor who covers designers in your region, or through a publicist who already knows them.
Exclusivity: plan your order
Most of the titles above want to be first. AD will not consider work that has appeared anywhere; Luxe wants it never to have been in a magazine and not already shown on social media; Interior Design excludes projects that ran as a US or Canadian magazine feature; Dwell's contracts include an exclusivity period.
That makes the order of your pitches a decision, not an afterthought:
- Start at the top of your realistic list. If AD is a real possibility for this project, send it there first and wait out the 90 days.
- Then the next tier, one at a time: Luxe (if you are in one of its regions), Interior Design, House Beautiful, Dwell.
- Hold the social reveal until the project is placed or you have decided to self-publish it. A carousel posted today can cost you a feature next month.
- After publication, use the feature everywhere: your site, your portfolio, Houzz, and in pitches for the next project.
A submission email template
Subject: PROJECT SUBMISSION: [Project name], [city] ([type: full renovation / new build / apartment])
Dear [Editor name or team],
I'd like to submit [project name], a [type] in [city] for [client type], completed in [month, year]. It has not been published anywhere, and we are offering it to [publication] first.
The story: [one or two sentences: the brief, the constraint, the idea that shaped the design].
Attached / linked: [number] professional photographs by [photographer], floor plan, and credits (architect: [name]; builder: [name]; key sources). The homeowners [are happy to be named / prefer privacy] and [would / would not] allow a reshoot.
Thank you for considering it.
[Name], [firm], [phone], [website]
For AD, send it as a PDF with that exact subject line. For Luxe and Interior Design, paste the same content into their forms. More pitch shapes are in our pitch templates, and how to get featured in the news covers pitching outside the design press.
Awards worth entering
Awards give you a reason to be written about and a line on every future pitch. The ones with published details:
| Award | What the organiser states |
|---|---|
| NKBA Design Competition | Due 4 October; members $175 / $150 / $100, non-members $225 / $200 / $175; projects installed 1 January 2025 to 27 August 2026 |
| IIDA Global Excellence Awards 2026 | Open 1 September to 13 October 2026, $350 to $650 depending on date and membership; projects outside the US only |
| AIA Interior Architecture Award (2027 cycle) | Due 3 November 2026; $450 per project; must name an AIA Architect member |
| Interior Design Best of Year | 2026 deadlines (10 and 18 September) have passed; watch for the next cycle |
| ASID national FOCUS Project Awards | 2026 cycle closed 21 April 2026; ASID chapters run their own Design Excellence awards |
| Luxe RED Awards | Its site says 2027 entries are open; we could not read the fee or deadline |
House Beautiful also takes nominations for its Next Wave list of emerging designers through a separate address on its masthead page.
Regional and local press
Regional home and lifestyle magazines, city magazines and the home sections of local newspapers are where most designers get their first features. They need local projects, they have fewer submissions than national titles, and a regional feature is often what a national editor notices. Pitch them the same way: one unpublished project, professional photos, a local angle. Luxe is itself regional, which is why it asks where you are based.
Keep a simple list of the editors who cover homes in your area. Our media list guide shows how.
What design blogs ask for
Beyond magazines sits a large layer of design and home blogs, and they behave differently. When MentionAgent pitched 129 websites about their interior design posts on behalf of customers between July and September 2026, 8 replied, 2 said yes, and 4 of the 8 replies asked to be paid, with quotes from $145 to $500 (median $250). The median site had a Domain Rating of 34. The sample is small, and 119 of the 129 sites were pitched for one customer, an AI rendering and virtual staging company. The same customer pitching architecture sites got eight yeses and one price request, so the difference is the kind of site: interior design blog owners know their audience is commercially valuable and price accordingly.
That is worth knowing before you spend money. A paid blog post is advertising; a magazine feature or an editor's mention is not. Where a blog does mention you for free, it is also a link and a citation that search engines and AI assistants read. MentionAgent automates finding those sites and handling the replies, including the ones that name a price. Our guide to collaborating with bloggers has the wider dataset.
Hiring a publicist: what it costs
Most of the results for "PR for interior designers" are specialist PR firms, so we checked what they charge, on their own websites, on 23 September 2026:
| Firm (ranks for this search) | Published price | Minimum term |
|---|---|---|
| The Storied Group | Full-service retainer from $6,000/month; one home-tour placement for a $5,000 flat fee; a media-opportunities membership at roughly $1,200 to $1,500/month | 6 months for the retainer; none for the single placement |
| A Design Partnership | PR from $4,500/month | 6 months, then month to month |
| Caroline Pinkston PR | None published | Not stated |
| The Consultancy PR | None published | Not stated |
| The Dove Agency | "Menu-based" pricing, no figures | Not stated |
| Keywork PR | Could not check (its current site could not be confirmed) |
Read plainly: where a design PR firm does publish, a first commitment runs from about $27,000 (six months at $4,500) to $36,000 (six months at $6,000). The lower-risk option is paying per placement, $5,000 for a single home tour. The firms that publish nothing send you to an inquiry form, so expect to learn the price on a call.
A publicist is worth that when you have more publishable projects than time to pitch them, want titles without an open submission route (Elle Decor and Veranda have none we could find), or need editors they already know. With one or two projects a year, the free routes above usually make more sense. If you do hire, ask which editors they have placed work with in the past year and how they handle exclusivity across titles. For general PR agency pricing, see our PR agency pricing study; if you work with an architecture practice, see PR for architects.
Mistakes that cost a feature
Posting the full reveal first. Luxe says so directly, and AD will not consider anything published elsewhere.
Pitching several titles at once. If two say yes, you will have to withdraw from one, and that editor will remember.
Weak photography. Every title that states specs asks for professional images; a magazine will not fix a dark phone photo.
Missing credits or permissions. Editors need to name the architect, builder and photographer, and they need to know the homeowners agreed.
Paying a stranger for a "guaranteed" feature. Several major design titles label their brand content ("From ELLE Decor for [brand]"). If someone promises editorial coverage for a fee, ask exactly where it will run and how it will be labelled.
Frequently asked questions
How do interior designers get published in magazines?
Choose a finished, professionally photographed project that has not been published anywhere, including social media, and submit it to one magazine at a time through that title's own route. Architectural Digest takes PDFs at [email protected] with "PROJECT SUBMISSION" in the subject line; Interior Design magazine uses a Submittable form; Dwell takes pitches at [email protected].
How do I submit my project to Architectural Digest?
Email a PDF to [email protected] with "PROJECT SUBMISSION" in the subject line. AD does not consider work published elsewhere, in print or digital, reads everything within 90 days, and only contacts you if it accepts the project.
Do design magazines want exclusive projects?
Most do. Architectural Digest will not consider work published elsewhere, Luxe requires that the project has never been in a magazine and asks that it not already be on social media, Interior Design excludes projects that ran as a US or Canadian magazine feature, and Dwell contracts include a period of exclusivity. Submit to one title at a time.
How do I get featured on Houzz?
Houzz's pro page says to upload the project to your Houzz profile and email the link to [email protected], with the project type in the subject line. It looks for projects completed in the past year, photos at least 2,400 px wide, before-and-after shots and budget information.
How much does PR for interior designers cost?
Of six interior design PR firms that rank on Google for this search, two publish prices: retainers from $4,500 and $6,000 a month, both with six-month minimums, and one sells a single home-tour placement for $5,000 flat. The other four publish no price. Submitting projects to magazines yourself is free.
Do interior designers need a publicist?
Not to start. The main magazines publish open submission routes. A publicist is worth it when you have more publishable projects than time, want titles without an open route such as Elle Decor or Veranda, or need existing editor relationships.