ITV Meridian - Studios

Studios

When Meridian originally won the franchise in 1991, their plans were to purchase buildings, not unlike their current arrangement today: with a small studio for continuity and local news. This was planned because being a publisher-broadcaster they did not plan to make any programmes themselves, instead buying in programmes from independent production companies. However, when TVS lost their franchise, TVS' plans were to become an independent production company based at Vinters Park, Maidstone, where the former TVS South East division was located. Meridian took the opportunity to purchase the Southampton studios from TVS.

Meridian did put these studios to good use in the future; on some occasions, Meridian would hire their studios out to the independent companies to use for the programmes and under the ownership of United News & Media some Channel 5 programmes were made there. However, as a publisher-broadcaster, the facilities were generally too big for Meridian. By 2004, ITV plc had decided that regional programming would be phased out in the years to come. In 2004, Meridian closed their Northam studios and moved to a unit in a business park in Whiteley. These new headquarters at Forum One, Solent Business Park, contained a newsroom plus the main technical production and transmission arms of the programmes including three small news studios.

In the summer of 2008, Meridian's former studios at Southampton started to be dismantled with plans for a multi-storey block of flats to be built. In December 2010, the site was still lying empty after the developer Oakdene fell into administration in 2009.

Over the weekend of 22–23 October 2011, ITV Meridian moved to new premises in Fusion Three, on the same business park at Whiteley and across the road from their previous office. The new headquarters are again based in a conventional office building, and include two studios, one of which is used for Meridian Tonight. The move was due to the cancellation of the lease at its former Whiteley premises.

In addition to Meridian's Southampton headquarters, the company operated other studios and news bureaus. Upon launch, the South East operation was operated out of The Maidstone Studios before moving to a purpose-built studio centre at New Hythe near Maidstone in Kent in 1994. Following the move of the studio to Whiteley, the complex closed with a south-east newsroom with producers and reporters being moved back to The Maidstone Studios. Additionally, Meridian originally opened and operated a new studio complex at Newbury for their Meridian West operation. This closed in 2001, when the studio was moved to Southampton.