Howards' Way

Howards' Way is a television drama series produced by BBC Birmingham and transmitted on BBC1 between 1 September 1985 and 25 November 1990. The series deals with the personal and professional lives of the wealthy yachting and business communities in the fictional town of Tarrant on the south coast of England, and was filmed on the River Hamble and the Solent.

The series was notable for its pioneering camerawork on board yachts, often filming multiple yachts racing in choppy waters and high winds, and its extensive location shooting mainly on the south coast of Britain. Most of the location filming for the series was carried out in Bursledon, Hamble, Swanwick, Warsash, Hill Head, Lee-on-the-Solent, Lymington, Hythe, Southampton and Fareham—all in Hampshire. The Jolly Sailor pub in Bursledon featured in several episodes.

All interiors were filmed in Studio A at the BBC Pebble Mill studios in Edgbaston, Birmingham. Extensive two-storey sets were constructed inside the studio (the Howards and the Urquhart homes were both functioning two-floor sets). The smaller Studio B (used for regional news) was also occasionally used as an on-screen fashion photography studio. Other areas of the large 1970s TV and radio complex (opened in 1971) were used for the many board room scenes in the series, with long corridors and lifts sometimes doubling as a busy hospital and meeting rooms became lavish corporate hospitality suites.