From designing flyers for underground raves to leading the creative charge at Boomtown Festival, Carl Cozier Bristol-based designer shares a refreshingly honest take on forging a creative career outside the traditional path. In this interview, he reflects on finding his style through DJ culture, navigating the demands of parenthood and pandemic life, and why trusting your quirks is the key to making standout work in a saturated world.
Can you tell us a little about your first few steps in your career. Was there a moment or experience when you realised this was what you'd do as a career?
I always felt a pull towards art. As a dyslexic I didn’t do as well academically and certainly didn’t have a plan B so I did my Foundation studies at Oxfordshire School of Art, and went on to specialise in Graphic Design at Swansea University in Wales. Upon graduation I was featured in the New Designers Exhibition (Islington, London) However, I still struggled to get agency level work. I’m embarrassed to say that it knocked my confidence and I gave up for a bit. I assumed my work just wasn’t commercially viable. So I turned my back on what I saw, at the time, as the ‘traditional route’.
I was doing pretty well at DJing (competing nationally) and as an event promoter so I channeled my creativity into the flyers and branding for these events. I still find designing for music incredibly freeing, it allows you to combine disciplines in a more uninhibited way. I went on to design a few album covers, and then larger and larger events sought me out. It set me on a path that would result in me becoming Head of Design for the multi award-winning Boomtown Festival (UK). Looking back, that was the right route for me. I learned a hell of a lot doing it the long way and, I feel my work is richer and more multifaceted as a result.
What lessons from your career have most shaped your style and approach?
Having two small children has massively changed my approach in recent years, you don’t really notice how much time you had until you have kids. You realise that you were literally swimming in oceans of time. I’ve had to make every second count in the studio and it’s forced me to really cut down on procrastination and streamline lots of processes.
But perhaps the biggest changes to my style happened during the UK lockdowns. I was lucky enough to be placed on ‘furlough’. Basically, paid leave while the pandemic raged and the events industry slept. This gift of time offered me a chance to reconnect with my practice and explore my style outside of the music industry. Connecting with other out-of-work creatives and getting involved with charity projects. It was a super inspiring time for me. It led to a bunch of really amazing opportunities and helped foster some great creative partnerships that still bear fruit today.
It was during this time that I felt the need to leave full time employment and become a freelancer and dig down into the variety of projects that this would open up. It wasn’t until this point that I had even tried to have a style of my own. My work was all over the map stylistically due to the ever-changing needs of events. Lockdowns massively shaped my approach and helped me hone in on the type of work that would bring me back daily to experiment and play. I’d say that as direct result of the pandemic, and the work I did in that period, my style became more focused on colour, more playful and more optimistic.
Tell us about the core values or philosophies that guide your creative practice.
Here's a couple of things I often come back to time and time again:
Seeking Play: I always like to approach all my work with a playful attitude. I recognise play in my personal work as hugely important. I crave it when I'm in a busy client period and look forward to the pockets of time I carve out to do a quick song-based typographic experiment, or similar.
Being Less Precious: Rejection of the perfectionist ideals that plagued my earlier work. I’m not even sure if anyone would notice this actually, I guess that’s sort of the point! You can spend hours and hours tweaking inconsequential parts of an artwork - obsessive perfectionism is the enemy.
Being More Me: Trying to lean into the quirks of my process, as opposed to trying to fit in. These parts are usually the aspects of the work that will feel the most unique and authentic in this world of visual overload!
Divide & Conquer : I like to divide up my work using clipping paths which I then populate with patterns, or typography and saturated colours - I feel that over the years I’ve used these methods as a way to describe diverse communities, or even my own scatty neurodiverse brain. Dense colour and pattern singing next to each other to me carries with it a powerful message of togetherness and Joy!
There’s probably a lot more but this will do for now.
How important is it that creative professionals find their unique voice?
I think having a recognisable and authentic creative voice is almost as important as the work itself these days. You won't stand out from the crowd if you only mimic what you see on your IG feed. It needn’t happen straight away, it’ll likely reveal itself when you put the work in. I'm not even 100% sure if i’m quite there yet but, people tell me they recognise my work so that’s encouraging.
Looking ahead, what do you think are the key factors that will influence change for creative professionals?
I mean I hate it but I feel generative ai will be one of the most influential factors for creatives.Whether we love it or loathe it, it is here to stay in some form or another so we all need to find a way to work with it and use it as a force to aid human creativity and not replace it.
How much does your city influence your work?
Bristol has significantly influenced my work from the moment I moved from Wales. I'm constantly surprised and energised by it’s larger-than-life personality. It’s a city fizzing with creative energy. It is of course synonymous with activism, underground music, and a street art scene that is second-to-none. How could it not influence your work!? I am always trying to capture its energy. I love this wild city!
How much does your culture influence your work?
Street art and rave culture has always an important influence on my work. Djing created the original spark for design and eventually it allowed me to design and DJ for some of the best dance stages in the UK. This deep dive into festival and rave culture has profoundly shaped me, my attitudes and my aesthetic, which often features challenging, trippy and oversaturated artwork.
Tell us some of your favourite, creative professionals and inspiring places in your city!
Bristol’s is home to ‘Upfest’ Europe's largest street art and graffiti festival and always features a slew of amazing locals. Inkie, HazardOne, Mr Penfold are some of my favourites. Bristol is full of inspiring places too, I’ve got to hype the team over at Boomtown festival HQ based in St Phillips as the amount of creative folks that work on this show is eye-watering. There is also ‘Wake The Tiger’ which is an immersive ‘Amazement Park’ that is 100% worth checking out if you are in Bristol. I will actually be working with them soon on a super fun project! Bristol is a great part of the world for creatives and too many people and places to mention here.
What should emerging creative professionals keep in mind as they begin their design career?
- Trust yourself, trust your creative vision and trust your process!
- Don’t be too hard on yourself.
- There is no ‘right’ creative route and quite often things won’t go the way you plan, roll with the punches and as long as you're heading in a creative direction you're doing great!
- Keep doing things that feel slightly out of your depth. You’ll find some interesting things happen with that mindset!
- Know your worth, You can’t pay your rent on exposure!
- Don’t give up!
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