The Creative Boom Podcast

Lettering artist, designer and University of Worcester fellow Rob Draper joins Katy Cowan to close out the season with a warm, philosophical conversation about starting over and the art of creating something from nothing.

Rob opens up about the redundancy that upended his life at 40, the period when he cleared out a warehouse waiting for work that never came, and the decision that changed everything: to try anything, turn down nothing, and trust that action creates action. From teaching art in a men's prison to drawing on Starbucks cups and learning sign writing from a canal-barge painter, he shares how saying yes to the unexpected slowly built a career – and how COVID later pushed him back towards being the artist he'd always wanted to be.

Together they get honest about the "messy middle" of a creative life: redundancy, divorce, losing the house and starting again on a camp bed at his sister's, and what happens when the trappings of success you can no longer afford force you to rethink what success even means. Rob makes the case for baby steps over big leaps, for keeping a creative "toolbox" of skills you might not need yet, and for kicking enough balls at goal that, eventually, one goes in.

With reflections on authenticity in the age of AI, why craft will always find an audience, and the quiet contentment of enjoying the path rather than chasing the destination, it's a generous, funny and reassuring listen for anyone facing uncertainty – and proof that going right back to square one might just be the best thing that ever happens to you.

In the second, faster, slightly more feral half of the recording this week, Katy Ennis-Hargreaves of BOLDISM stays in the chair for The Spark – the rapid-fire round where the questions get cheekier and the answers get more honest.

Top of the agenda is her renowned and entirely unrepentant hatred of crocs, a feud so well known that former colleagues now send her "croc bait" on a weekly basis. From there, she makes the case against the beige, clean-girl aesthetic taking over the high street, and argues that the world simply needs more colour.

It's not all footwear-based warfare. Katy shares the small habit that actually rescues her work day, explains why "fake it till you make it" is the one piece of advice she'd ban from the industry forever, and pays tribute to Vivienne Westwood as her creative hero, the designer who insisted she wasn't a fashion designer at all but an activist.

Along the way, there's a frank confession about the last thing Katie "stole", a question handed forward to next week's guest, Rob Draper, and a gloriously unprofessional detour into why being bold means having genuine substance rather than just climbing.

Warm, daft and refreshingly raw in all the right places, it's a reminder that you can run a serious creative business and still have an enormous amount of fun doing it.

Katy Ennis-Hargreaves of design studio BOLDISM joins Katy Cowan for an honest conversation about what happens when you stop watering yourself down and start living as your full self.

They dig into imposter syndrome as a driver rather than a hindrance, the years of being told you're "too awkward" or "too different", and the slow, organic transition toward going all in on who you really are.

Katy shares her journey from interior architecture graduate to independent designer with a leopard-print car, why she abandoned the rigid agency blueprint in favour of a more collaborative, human way of working, and how being part of the grassroots Wilson's Republic community keeps her grounded.

Along the way, they tackle the bullshit-bingo language of the design world, the difference between genuine substance and hollow social climbing, why "fake it till you make it" deserves the bin, and the truth that no one can ever really copy you because there's only one of you.

Warm, funny and refreshingly unprofessional in all the best ways, it's a chat about finding the courage to be bold, the people who shaped us, and remembering we only get one go on this rock.

It's time for the Spark – our weekly bonus episode where we step away from the work and get to know our guest a little better through a round of quick, fun questions. No prep, no warning, no idea what's coming.

This week, host Katy Cowan puts Malika Favre on the spot, and the result is exactly the sort of relaxed, slightly daft chat you'd have with a mate over a glass of wine. They cover the small things that instantly improve a working day, what Malika's creative style would sound like if it had a theme tune, and the dream dinner party she'd throw, given two guests, dead or alive. There's a trend she's quietly very over, a surprising skill she'd love to steal from another world entirely, and the one country's food she'd happily eat for the rest of her life.

And then there's the question Malika was secretly hoping she'd be asked – which leads to a rather cheeky confession about her younger years. A short, warm, and very good-natured way to round off the week. Enjoy!

Artist and illustrator Malika Favre joins host Katy Cowan for a wide-ranging conversation about building a creative career on your own terms. They talk about why Malika left London after fifteen years for the slower, sunnier rhythm of Barcelona, and the strange guilt of trying to take it easy in a city that never lets you.

Malika reflects on becoming an illustrator later in life at 28, why the years she spent as an in-house designer at studios like Airside gave her the business head that helped her survive freelancing, and how she resisted being put in a box – even turning down lucrative erotic commissions after her Kama Sutra book made her name, so she could keep that side of her work personal.

They get into the real state of the industry too: shrinking budgets, impossible briefs, and what AI means for illustrators starting out today. Malika makes the case that anything handmade and deeply personal will only become more valuable because no one can copy what comes from within.

Along the way, there's talk of growing up without a TV in the suburbs of Paris, the strong women who shaped her, the oversharing of vulnerability online, and her side venture, I Can't Afford This But Maybe She Can, which gives a voice to independent makers. Honest, funny and full of hard-won wisdom, it's a chat about stamina, taste, and why there will always be space for people with talent.