Are creatives really leaving the UK in droves, and if so, why?

Recently, we posted on LinkedIn asking whether creatives were actually leaving the UK, or just thinking about it.

We expected a handful of responses. Instead, we got more than 100. Some had already gone. Some were counting the months. And some were staying, but not without question marks hanging over that decision.

So what’s going on? Well, I’d love to sum it up in a single sentence, but the picture is actually complex. It’s not a simple tale of mass exodus and discontent. It’s more about a profession taking stock of where it actually wants to be, now that remote working has made the question feel genuinely answerable.

The ground-level reality

For many, the push factors are economic. Samuel Tinson-Wood, co-founder of Thump Studio, describes the third year of running his brand and design agency with his wife Katie. “Work slowed across the board, enquiries reduced, projects became smaller, and clients grew more cautious, elongating their decision-making,” he explains. “We may not officially be in recession, but on the ground, it feels like the early stages of one. Budgets are scrutinised more heavily, and long-term brand investment is often the first thing to be postponed.”

Many small and mid-sized studios across the UK are seeing the same contraction. But being based on the Isle of Wight adds an extra layer. “Does that small stretch of water create more of a barrier than we realised?” he ponders. “Are we missing out on not being in the energy of creative hubs and faster-moving markets?”

Creative executive Lou Bones didn’t have that worry, being in the UK’s capital city. Yet she still decided to up sticks and head to Greece. “After 16 years in London, three burnouts, a round of layoffs, the millionth rent hike and no way to build a deposit unless you’ve got a leg up already, I decided to move and take a chance on working for myself,” she explains.

Lifestyle, alignment – and the weather

The destinations that came up most often in these discussions were Portugal, Spain, France and Australia, with Germany, Italy, Cyprus, Japan and Greece also featuring. The common thread isn’t just the cost of living. It’s a broader sense of alignment: between how people work and how they want to live. But is the grass always greener somewhere else? That’s certainly not a given.

Interior designer Calum Wilson moved to Morzine in the French Alps in 2020, partly because his French partner was returning home and partly because COVID had wiped out his savings, and a visa window was briefly open. Five years on, he’s candid about what living in France actually costs.

“It essentially makes everything harder,” he reports. “Financially, emotionally, professionally. It’s taken five years to get to the point where it feels fairly steady and reliable, and the only reason is that I was stubborn enough to want to keep the lifestyle.”

His office is next to a ski lift for lunchtime snowboarding, and Geneva provides quick links back to London and Bristol, where his clients are based. It was his dream, he’s attained it, and he’d encourage others to do the same. “If there’s something outside the UK that you want, whether that’s more sunshine, a culture or a hobby, I’d say go for it,” says Calum. “The worst thing that can happen is you move back.”

Meanwhile, the places that most appeal to Samuel—Brisbane, the Gold Coast, parts of California—also offer something specific. “It’s not about escapism; it’s about alignment,” he says. “We’re asking whether a different environment could unlock new momentum. Consistent sunlight and warmth may seem superficial, but psychologically, it changes pace, optimism and social culture.”

When the visa doesn’t come through

Practically speaking, though, the challenges can be immense. Take art director Bethia Connolly, who spent two years freelancing in Melbourne and came very close to staying permanently. She’d completed a highly regarded Australian advertising course, finished in the top 10, and built a copywriting partnership. In the end, though, the path to a visa closed repeatedly, not from lack of talent but from paperwork.

“I had a handful of opportunities that could have led to sponsorship, and I know the creative directors advocated for me,” she explains. “But it was a matter of red tape in the end. When I found out it wouldn’t go ahead, I felt a sense of relief, but also a shattering. They’d been put off by the large amount of admin, a line I’d heard plenty of times already.”

Back in the UK, she says it’s the blue skies of Melbourne she misses most: “It’s not the temperature that affects my mood, it’s the light.” But more broadly, “living abroad reshaped my perspective. It gave me confidence, resilience and clarity about what I value.” And so she no longer sees home as purely geographic. “It’s a mindset, something you consciously shape into feeling right for you.”

The business that travels

A recurring theme across these stories is the agency or studio that has decoupled from a single location. For instance, Ben Jory moved to New Zealand after eight years running creative agency Jory&Co in the UK and found, to his surprise, that the business grew. Half his team stayed in the northern hemisphere; the other half works with him in the southern hemisphere. “We’ve essentially built a business that doesn’t live in one place, and have access to the best talent globally,” he says.

The globalised nature of such operations, however, can make this all a little complicated emotionally. Take Liam Houlihan, who went to Amsterdam to launch Within Design Studio.

“Amsterdam definitely feels like home,” he says. “It did pretty quickly, actually. My partner and I moved during COVID, so ‘home’ became very literal. That being said, I’m in New York and London for work a fair bit, and whenever the wheels hit the tarmac, I get a pang of what’s either homesickness or nostalgia. It makes me think there’s still a part of me in all places. Home for me isn’t singular anymore, it’s layered. As parts of me were formed in each place and in each chapter I spent there. They don’t just disappear with a new relocation.”

Coming home

The journey abroad is not always one-way. Graphic designer Freddie Hall moved to New York at 22, worked at studios RoAndCo and Red Antler, and built what he describes as a formative chapter of his life. Then his niece was born, and something shifted. He came home. His take on the UK, seen from the outside, is unexpectedly warm.

“Living outside the UK has made me appreciate, for the most part anyway, how easy things are for us here,” he explains. “Grocery shopping, doctor’s appointments, submitting taxes, even something as mundane as returning a parcel, all feel slightly and unnecessarily more complex overseas. I know the UK is far from perfect: the weather, the trains, Nigel Farage… But it wasn’t until I left that I finally grew to love it.”

He’s not alone. James West, a brand designer who spent five years in New Zealand, came back to Somerset and found what he’d left: proximity to the people he loved, and the ability to hop to another country in a couple of hours. “Home is where the heart is,” he says; a cliché, he acknowledges, but one that earned its truth through distance.

What the UK still has

It’s a feeling I’m very familiar with, having lived in Japan for three years from 2004 to 2006. I loved the experience and love the country, but it also made me realise that there are many things the UK does particularly well, which you don’t notice until they’re gone.

Someone else who can appreciate these subtleties is Elizabeth Dewar. She grew up between Scotland and the Gulf, built her career across Europe and the UAE, and is now preparing to return to the Gulf with her brand consultancy Violet Rae.

Her view from abroad? “The UK has grit,” she enthuses. “There’s dark humour born from bad weather and worse political decisions. That sharp wit is everywhere. There’s a willingness to experiment without polishing everything to perfection, and there’s immense creative freedom in that. The UK’s creative energy thrives in the nooks and crannies of life: in pub conversations, street art and music scenes that feel raw and alive.”

What draws her back to the Gulf, though, is an energy of a different kind. “Here, if you say ‘I’m building something,’ the response is not narrow-eyed scepticism or a subject change,” she explains. “It’s: ‘Brilliant, tell me more, can I help?’ That combination of optimism, curiosity and willingness to act is invaluable.”

Key takeaway

The UK hasn’t stopped being a world-class place to make things, collaborate, and build a career. But for a generation of creatives who can genuinely work from anywhere, and who are watching their purchasing power and professional headroom quietly tighten, the question of whether it’s still the right place for them is one they’re asking with new urgency and, increasingly, acting on.

These honest reports, then, are neither fairy tales nor cautionary ones. Like most decisions in life, to coin a phrase, “It’s complicated”.