The women's glossy magazine market actually gained a circulation of around 6 percent, against an industry average of a 0.8 percent drop.

Condé Nast Managing Director Nicholas Coleridge said, "'No publisher is underestimating the challenge at newsstand, particularly in the months immediately following the September 11th tragedy. In this context, I am pleased that several of our titles - notably Vanity Fair and Condé Nast Traveller - can announce record circulations, and that Glamour has dramatically over-performed for the second period in succession."

British Glamour is the success story of not just the English arm of the publishing behemoth, but of Condé Nast as a whole. Its enormous growth since its launch in March last year has resulted in a UK circulation of 414,453, beating traditional market leader Cosmopolitan into second place in terms of UK sales.

Editor Jo Elvin is understandably happy. "The team and I are absolutely thrilled with this figure, which has exceeded all expectations. I always suspected that like me, thousands of women were ready for a magazine that delivered great, broad-appeal content without sacrificing quality or style. In the end, being proud of such a refreshingly different women's magazine possibly means even more to me than market position."

Emap also has cause to celebrate, as New Woman achieves its highest average monthly circulation since launch, reaching 305,088. The magazine, which has shown consistent and significant growth, has prospered alongside Red, which is up by 12 percent year-on-year at 173,774.

Meanwhile, over at IPC Southbank, now owned by AOL Time Warner, the barely year-old British edition of InStyle has failed to catch the English imagination in the same way as Glamour, registering an ABC of just 151,159. IPC Southbank's decision last March to replace Marie Claire editor Liz Jones with Marie O'Riordan in the face of falling sales figures has been justified though, with an ABC of 382,094, up 3.2 percent period-on-period.

In the traditional Harper's and Queen versus Tatler circulation battle, Harper's, under ex-Tatler deputy editor Lucy Yeoman's editorship, claims victory overall with an ABC of 86,039 against Tatler's 82,026. Tatler claims a higher UK circulation though, 71,094 versus 68,293.

British Vogue, under editor Alexandra Shulman, has an ABC standing at 195,967, a year-on-year drop of 3.7 percent.

The situation is not looking quite so healthy in the men's glossy magazine market, where the majority of titles have posted significant circulation drops, with an average period-on-period drop of 8.5 percent, and an average year-on-year drop of 13.5 percent.

Loaded is one of only three titles in the men's market to show a period-on-period increase. This is alongside Front and Men's Health, whose circulations also rose by 1.1 percent.

FHM, Maxim and Arena posted period-on-period drops of 18.5 percent, 9.3 percent and 23.8 percent, respectively.