Conde Nast Traveller is aimed squarely at the luxury end of the market, and for its February issue (out now), director of photography Caroline Metcalfe commissioned photographers to shoot several, very disparate destinations, from ski resorts to spas. She also asked New York-based photographer Christopher Baker to shoot the Indian Ocean island of Madagascar. Here she explains why.

Our assigned photographer, Christopher Baker, came back with about 300 frames, but that isn't unusual. In the middle of the magazine we have the 'well' - 52 pages uninterrupted by ads. So if I commission a photographer to shoot a story for that section, I know they will get 10, 12 or 14 pages, and I budget accordingly. I encourage photographers to shoot in both black-and-white and colour, and although I don't specify which images will be double-page spreads, or which image is likely open the feature, they will have those requirements in mind. I would expect to run at least a couple of double-page spreads, although it does depend on the location. It also works well to carve up the page and play images off each other.

We always send the photographer after the writer, so we know what we are illustrating. When the copy comes in I read through it and make a shoot list of what I'd expect to see with the story. I then talk the shoot through with the photographer. I match the photographer to the story, and who we use very much depends on the shoot. Sometimes we want someone who is very good at landscapes, at other times we may feature a hotel with nice interiors, so we need a specialist for that.

Christopher has worked with us before and I know he's very good at shooting both landscapes and people, which is quite unusual. He's also good at dealing with people - a valuable skill in Madagascar because it's not the most tourist-friendly place, especially when you're waving a camera about. Even still, I was surprised that he managed to shoot such intimate portraits in the marketplace.

He's shot for us a number of times before in the US, in Napa Valley and Martha's Vineyard, and his ability with people was very important there too. Wealthy people on holiday guard their privacy.

Christopher went to Madagascar last August. We were lucky - he was going to Africa anyway for another shoot, so we were able to add an extra week onto his trip. Where we shoot, and when, is seasonal. We won't shoot anything in Europe until late April or May, and we're shooting long-haul destinations now for the autumn issues. If you miss your slot on a particular location you might have to wait a year for another opportunity.

There's a certain look and feel to the photography we feature, and it's part of my job to ensure we have a sense of continuity. But I look for photographers who have a very strong personal style, so that if I have a certain need, I know who can shoot it for me. Photographers sometimes approach me saying 'I can shoot it like this, I can shoot it like that, whatever you want really'. For me, that's completely the wrong approach.

Wallpaper*  styles itself as a 'design, interiors, fashion, art, lifestyle' magazine rather than a travel title, but its gained a strong reputation for its photography, and travel commissions are an important part of that. For its October 2008 edition, acting photography director James Reid commissioned Andrew Rowat to shoot Ashgabat, the capital of Turkmenistan. Reid talks through the process.

We often feature destinations that are off the beaten track. We have a wishlist of places we'd like to shoot, and we seem to have a soft spot for dictatorships. The magazine has a focus on architecture and design, and countries ruled by dictators seem to be particularly strong on mid-century Modernism. We were the first Western magazine to shoot in Pyongyang (capital of North Korea), where we had to promise not to shoot any stories on human rights. These places aren't for everyone, of course, but we do consider them travel destinations.

We've always wanted to shoot in Turkmenistan but it's so hard to access. It's a real nightmare. Then Andrew Rowat, who contributes a lot to the magazine, mentioned he'd been on some kind of guided tour of the capital, Ashgabat, so I immediately asked if he could do something on the architecture. He got a lot more access to people than we thought he would, and we had to think twice about publishing some of the images.

We always ensure that the architecture shots are very beautiful and clear, but it's not all about buildings. True, we don't often feature people in our shots, but sometimes we'll include interesting, enigmatic portraits. There aren't that many people who can do it all, so I usually end up with a list of about 10 photo-graphers we can work with. Stefan Ruiz (BJP, 10 January 2007), and Jonathan de Villiers (BJP, 16 February 2005) can both mix brilliant architecture shots with revealing, thoughtful photographs of people.

We usually send the writer and photographer to the destination together - when it's difficult to get people into an area it's often the only way. It also makes it easier for them to create a unified story. That means we really have to trust the photographer, so we prefer to use people we've been working with for a while. We normally send them for about a week, four or five days of shooting combined with two days of travelling.

We like to get an overview, to give some sense of the place, and we do research with the photographer and architecture editor to pick out five or six buildings we want to feature in the piece. We then try to get permission to shoot inside them.

If we commission a photographer they know it's going to be a really juicy story, about 10-12 pages or so. We look for the photographers to come back with 20 useable photographs, which are invariably shot on 5x4 for quality and for the architectural movements. This time, Andrew came back with a whole book's worth of images.