PODCAST · arts
CAPTN OffScript
by CAPTN OffScript
There's a version of the creative career conversation that almost never gets recorded.Not the award acceptance. Not the process breakdown. Not the polished origin story where every setback was secretly a setup. That version exists everywhere. This isn't that.CAPTN OffScript is where designers, founders, illustrators, and makers sit down and talk about what's actually going on — the fear before the pivot, the year where the work dried up, the identity crisis that came with success, the moment they almost stopped, and what kept them moving. The messy, honest, deeply human side of building a creative life.I'm Alen. I run a one-person type foundry called SilverStag Type, and I've been working in and around the design industry long enough to know what gets edited out of most interviews. I started this show because I was tired of highlight reels dressed up as conversations. I wanted to hear what creative people actually think — about money and meaning, about burnout and reinvention, about
Episodes
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Nick Liefhebber on paper cuts, printmaking and working with limitations
Illustrator Nick Liefhebber on paper cuts, woodcut printmaking, going independent one day at a time, and why limitations shape his work. "When you just start making things you like, it doesn't feel like work." Nick Liefhebber is an illustrator, designer and printmaker based in the Netherlands. He...
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Erik Herrström on brands that move culture, David Bowie and working without mood boards
Designer Erik Herrström on his book The Echo, why his studio never shows clients a mood board, and designing identities for Whitney Houston and Elvis Presley. "We never show mood boards to our clients, ever." Erik Herrström grew up in a small village in the south of Sweden and built his first...
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Murugiah on persistence, identity and his first museum show
Illustrator and artist MURUGIAH on leaving architecture, finding his own style, and opening the Quentin Blake Centre for Illustration with his first solo museum show. "Everything you've done, it doesn't have to just end. It can be fuel for what you do next." MURUGIAH trained as an architect for...
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E99 - Second Take: Kieron Anthony Lewis, "A Book Inside Concrete"
Kieron Anthony Lewis opens this one by saying he cannot do the project justice by describing it. That you almost have to see it. He is right, which is awkward for a podcast. So here it is: a 456-page hardback with gold foiling along the edges, sealed inside a case made of concrete, cast in the...
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E98 - Second Take: Andy J. Pizza, "Cultivate Yourself, Don't Overcome Yourself"
I asked Andy how long it took him to start liking himself the way he is. He did not give me a number. He said it is something he has to constantly return to and refresh. This is Second Take, a short format on the show. One idea, one guest, lifted out of a longer conversation. You do not need to...
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E97 — Second Take: Gemma O'Brien, "What Flow Actually Feels Like"
Gemma O'Brien describes flow as a forgetting of yourself. Fully absorbed, at one with the work, no sense of time passing. Then the conversation turns to boredom, and that half is the sharper one. This is Second Take, a short format on the show. One idea, one guest, lifted out of a longer...
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E96 - Second Take: Mat Voyce, "I Hated Motion Design"
Mat Voyce makes motion work for Nike, Pepsi and Disney+. He also tried animation at university, hated it, and decided he would never do it again. This is Second Take, a new short format on the show. One idea, one guest, lifted out of a longer conversation. You do not need to have heard the...
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Bonus 007 - Simon Flöter: His Grandfather's Love Letters & What He'd Make if Money Didn't Matter
This is the seventh Captn OffScript bonus, and the last one of Season 2. After a main episode spent in the trenches, I asked Simon Flöter one question that flips it all upside down: if you woke up tomorrow with complete financial stability, never worrying about money again, what would you work…
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S02/E38 - Simon Flöter on Life in the Trenches & Not Making Decisions From Fear
For the final episode of Season 2, I didn't want a victory lap. Simon Flöter is a German illustrator, designer and developer living in Amsterdam, and he told me early on: this is not a success story. This is from the trenches. His commercial illustration work vanished this year, and he suspects…
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Bonus 006 - Halli Thorleifsson: Rebuilding Yourself Brick by Brick
This is the sixth bonus episode of Captn OffScript. In Halli Thorleifsson's main episode we covered everything he's built: the agency he sold to Twitter and rebuilt, the almost 2,000 wheelchair ramps, the tax he chose to pay. This is the conversation about what he's been rebuilding underneath it...
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Bonus 005 — Teresa Ferreira: Whose Voice Is That? Making Peace with Imposter Syndrome
This is the fifth bonus episode of Captn OffScript. When Teresa Ferreira and I recorded her main episode, we got into imposter syndrome and self-worth, and it was honest enough that I kept it back for this. It went to newsletter subscribers first as a private YouTube link. Today it's available…
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S02/E37 - Halli Thorleifsson on Building Ueno Twice & Designing Things People Actually Use
Haraldur "Halli" Thorleifsson built the design agency Ueno from nothing, sold it to Twitter in 2021, and made a decision almost nobody makes: he structured the sale so he'd pay as much tax as possible, in Iceland, on purpose. Because Iceland is the country that gave a kid from a poor family with...
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S02/E36 - Teresa Ferreira on Digging Her Way Into Design & Letting Go of the Perfect Day
Some people walk a straight line into design. Teresa Ferreira dug her way in, through archaeology. She was born in Lisbon, spent part of her childhood in Macau, has lived in London for nineteen years, ran design at the Financial Times, and now runs her own studio, Ferrgood. When I said she felt...
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Bonus 004 - Gemma O'Brien: Making Peace with Burnout & Studying the Flow State
This is the fourth bonus episode of Captn OffScript. When Gemma O'Brien and I recorded her main episode, we got into burnout and flow, and I held that part back for this. It went to newsletter subscribers first as a private YouTube link. Today it's available here too. Gemma has talked about…
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Bonus 003 - Radim Malinic: The Sabre-Tooth Tiger in Your Head & Why You Can't Unlearn Fear
This is the third bonus episode of Captn OffScript. When Radim Malinic and I recorded his main episode, the conversation about fear came near the end, and it was good enough that I kept it back for this. It went to newsletter subscribers first as a private YouTube link. Today it's available here...
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S02/E35 - Gemma O'Brien on Getting Bored of Herself & Refusing to Pick One Thing
Gemma O'Brien is a lettering artist, a fine artist, a muralist, and most recently a student of neuroaesthetics. She's painted a billboard in Times Square, had work acquired by a museum, and she has a public Strava profile on her website, because running is as much a part of her as the lettering…
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Bonus 002 - Martyna Wędzicka: Posters Made of Yarn & Why Graphic Designers Don't Retire
This is the second bonus episode of Captn OffScript. When Martyna Wędzicka and I recorded her main episode, we spent most of it on the past and the present. But right at the end, I asked her where she's heading next, and the answer was so warm and so hopeful that I held it back for this. It went…
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S02/E34 - Radim Malinic on Creativity as Escape & Becoming More of Who You Already Are
Radim Malinic has been a role model of mine for years. He's a designer, a writer, a speaker, he runs the agency Brand Nu, he hosts his own podcast, and he's built a whole philosophy around the idea of daring creativity. I expected this conversation to be about all of that output. Instead it…
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Bonus 001 - CJ Cawley & Alen: The Scripts We Were Given & the People Who Helped Us Change Them
his is the first-ever bonus episode of Captn OffScript. CJ Cawley and I recorded the main S02/E32 conversation for over an hour and twenty minutes, and somewhere around the hour mark it took a turn that didn't belong in the main episode and didn't deserve to be cut either. So we held it back. It...
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S02/E33 - Martyna Wędzicka on Being Weird, Polish Design & Why You Can't Rush Your Style
Martyna Wędzicka is a Polish graphic designer from Gdańsk with one of the most distinctive styles working today. She's a member of Alliance Graphique Internationale, a two-time winner of the Polish Graphic Design Awards, and she built her entire body of work on something most designers are taught...
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S02/E32 - CJ Cawley: Getting Cloned, Getting Married & Showing Up Anyway
CJ Cawley is having the strangest year of his career. Someone built a pixel-for-pixel clone of his website and replaced his face with theirs. A parody video of him triggered a wave of hate inside the design community. He's getting married this weekend. And through all of it, he keeps showing up…
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S02/E31 - Kristof Devos on Designing Watches That Tell You to Slow Down & the Art of Doing Nothing
Kristof Devos answered the call from his studio in a small town in rural Belgium, with a cat wandering in and out and his daughter's eighth birthday party happening that same afternoon. It felt like the right way to start a conversation about slowing down. Kristof Devos is an illustrator, a...
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S02/E30 - Andy J. Pizza on ADHD, Self-Worth & Cultivating Yourself Instead of Fixing Yourself
Episode 30 of Season 2. The 80th episode I've recorded since starting this show. And honestly, I couldn't have picked a better guest to mark a milestone like that. Andy J. Pizza is the host of Creative Pep Talk, an illustrator, a children's book author, and one of the people who has quietly…
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S02/E29 - Luis Mendo on Finding Your Value, Mundo Mendo & Why Social Media Is Dry Disgusting Bread
He grew up in Salamanca. Spent 20 years as an art director in Amsterdam. His father died. He boarded a plane to Japan for a sabbatical — and 14 years later, he's still there. Luis Mendo is a Spanish illustrator and the founder of Mundo Mendo — a personal membership project built on illustrated...
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S02/E28 - Temi Coker: Put the Work You Want to Be Hired For & Everything Else Follows
He wakes up at 4:30am. Two kids under two. Three hours of work before the house comes alive. This is how one of the most sought-after artists in America currently operates. Temi Coker is a Nigerian-American artist and creative director based in Dallas, Texas. His work has appeared in campaigns…
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S02/E27 — Ingrid Picanyol: I'm a Designer, But Other Things Too — Poetry, Punk & Philosophy
She chose graphic design over photography because she couldn't afford a camera. She chose it over philosophy because her teacher said get work first, study ideas later. Now she runs a studio of exactly three people, plays guitar in an all-women punk band with no expectations, writes articles on…
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S02/E26 - Marta Cerdà Alimbau: Vogue, Nike, Bats in the House & Why Design Is Worth Fighting For
She designed a Vogue cover during COVID while riding her motorcycle through Barcelona without a helmet. She made over 300 logos before landing on the one for a Nike Haaland campaign. She survived a pandemic across two countries paying two rents simultaneously — and ended up in a farmhouse with...
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S02/E25 - Elliot Jay Stocks on Books, Newsletters & Why Human Connection Is Everything
He's back. And this time we accidentally planned a Madrid book event live on air. Elliot Jay Stocks is a designer, writer, editor, and the person behind Fine Specimens — a brand new book showcasing contemporary type design from 69 foundries, including three of mine. We talked about the book, the...
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S02/E24 - Philipp Louven: From Print Design to AI-First & Why Fundamentals Matter More Than Ever
He started with die cuts and packaging catalogues at a print agency. He co-authored typography books with Slanted. He moved to Istanbul on a creative whim. And now he's the lead designer at Kittl — one of Europe's fastest-growing AI-powered design platforms. The through-line? A deep belief that…
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S02/E23 - Sergio del Puerto: From Serial Cut to ZAGALE & Why He's More Excited Than Ever
He founded Serial Cut in Madrid in 1999. For nearly 30 years it became one of the most recognised creative studios in the world. And then he let it go — not because he failed, but because something new had already taken hold of him completely. Sergio del Puerto is an art director, image maker…
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S02/E22 - Sophia Yeshi: Self-Taught, Underfunded & the First Artist on a UPS Box
She learned Photoshop at 12 on multiple 30-day trials. She got into five art schools and couldn't afford a single one. She moved to New York with no job, no safety net, and no plan B. And then her artwork went around the world on a UPS box. Sophia Yeshi is a New York-based illustrator whose bold,...
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S02/E21 — Jessica Hische: I'm Already Living the Life Millionaires Dream Of Having Someday
Lettering legend Jessica Hische sat in a room full of ultra-successful entrepreneurs — and realised they all dreamed of doing exactly what she was already doing. Drums, stained glass, creative hobbies, time with their kids, work they actually love. Her life, right now. In this episode, we go well...
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S02/E20 - Jacob Cass: From Student Blogger to Disney Designer & Why Sharing Process Matters
Jacob Cass started a blog in 2007 as a design student in Sydney, documenting his learning journey. That simple act of sharing imperfect work caught the attention of a New York agency and launched a career designing for Disney, Nike, and Red Bull. Nearly 20 years later, Jacob has traveled to 88...
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S02/E19 - What Do You Want to Be Known For? Geri Kriechbaum on Self-Taught Design & Identity
What do you want to be known for in five years? Austrian brand designer Geri Kriechbaum asks himself this question constantly — and it's transformed how he builds Stroncton, his brand design studio. In this episode, Geri shares his journey from technical engineer to self-taught designer, the...
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S02/E18 - Scott Fuller on What It Really Takes to Succeed as an Independent Designer
In this episode, I sit down with Scott Fuller to talk about what it truly means to succeed as an independent designer. We move beyond surface-level advice and dig into the realities of building a sustainable design career. Scott shares how consistency, reliability, and long-term thinking have...
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S02/E17 - Armin Vit & Bryony Gomez-Palacio on Building a Creative Life Together Without Compromise
In this episode, I talk with Armin Vit and Bryony Gomez-Palacio about building a creative life together and what that really looks like behind the scenes. We discuss their path into design writing, publishing, and criticism, the origins and evolution of Brand New, and the choices that led them…
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S02/E16 - Hyperfocus on What Matters – Building a Modern Design Studio Without the Noise
In this episode, I sit down with Paul and Jan, founders of Hyperfocus, to talk about building a design studio with intention in an industry that constantly pulls your attention in a hundred different directions. We discuss how Hyperfocus was founded during a moment of uncertainty, and how that...
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S02/E15 - Alex Trochut on Creativity, Identity, and Staying Human in a Hyper-Optimized World
In this episode, I sit down with Alex Trochut for one of the most personal and reflective conversations we’ve had on the podcast. We talk about creativity, identity, and what it really means to stay human in a world that constantly pushes optimization, speed, and output. Alex shares stories from...
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S02/E14 - Cat How on Purpose-Driven Branding and Building a Business That Reflects Your Values
Cat How is the co-founder of How&How and one of the most thoughtful voices in purpose-driven branding today. In this episode, we talk about her journey from journalism into design, founding and growing a global branding agency during the COVID pandemic, and what it takes to build a business that...
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S02/E13 - Michael Flarup on Creativity and Designing a Life Without a Master Plan
Michael Flarup is a designer, creative entrepreneur, and co-founder of Northplay. His career spans icon design, self-published books, and independent game development, shaped by curiosity rather than a fixed plan. In this conversation, we talk about growing up not fitting into traditional…
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S02/E12 - Kieron Anthony Lewis on Editorial Design, Identity, and Finding Meaning Through Work
Kieron Anthony Lewis is an editorial designer, speaker, educator, and Adobe Live host whose work is deeply rooted in culture, community, and meaning. In this conversation, we go far beyond design portfolios and talk about the life experiences that shaped how he works and why he creates. We…
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S02/E11 - James Barnard on Creativity, Speed, and Designing a Life You Love
James Barnard is one of the most recognizable logo designers working today, but this conversation goes far beyond logos. We talk about how he entered design at 25, why he left agency life, and how freelancing became the turning point that gave him freedom and clarity in his work. James shares how…
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S02/E10 - The Creative Life of Angela Lyons: Visibility, Intent, and Showing Up
In this episode of CAPTN OffScript, I sit down with UK based designer, creative director, and community builder Angela Lyons for a grounded and deeply honest conversation about the creative life. Angela has worked in the industry for more than 20 years across branding, editorial design, magazine...
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S02/E09 - David Airey on Creativity, Calm, and a Life Built With Intention
In this episode of CAPTN OffScript I sit down with David Airey, a designer whose books, thinking, and calm perspective have shaped how countless creatives approach identity design. But we go far beyond the craft in this conversation and explore the human side of a long creative life. David talks...
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S02/E08 - Mat Voyce on Anxiety, Creativity, and Finding Your Thing
In this episode of CAPTN OffScript I sit down with Mat Voyce, the designer known for his expressive type animation work and his instantly recognizable visual language. We go far beyond the craft in this conversation and dive into the emotional and personal side of being a creative today. Mat…
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S02/E07 - From Magic Tricks to Iconic Brands – The Bill Gardner Story
Bill Gardner has reviewed more logos than almost anyone on the planet — over 450,000 through his work with LogoLounge. But behind the numbers is a deep-thinking, long-game designer who believes that real identity design isn’t about trends — it’s about clarity, consistency, and curiosity. In this...
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S02/E06 - Redefining Indigenous Design: Jennifer Taback on Leading with Culture, Story, and Courage
Jennifer Taback didn’t set out to become the co-founder of one of Canada’s leading Indigenous creative studios — but that’s exactly what she’s built with Design de Plume. In this episode of CAPTN OffScript, Jennifer shares her journey from tech burnout to co-leading a values-driven design agency...
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S02/E05 - Destination: Design – A Conversation with Adrien Piro, CEO of Creative Market
From art teacher to tech CEO, Adrien Piro has taken one of the most unconventional paths to the top of the design world — and she’s now leading one of the most recognized creative platforms on the planet: Creative Market. In this episode of CAPTN OffScript, we talk about what it really takes to...
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S02/E04 - How SNASK Built a Creative Empire Without Playing by the Rules
From zero agency experience to global design legends, Erik and Freddie of SNASK have built one of the boldest, loudest, and most unforgettable creative studios in the world – and they did it all by breaking the rules. In this episode of CAPTN OffScript, we head to Stockholm (via pink offices and...
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S02/E03 – From Ponies to a 7-Figure Brand: Kristy Campbell’s Journey to Pink Pony Creative
From galloping around the backyard as a pony-obsessed kid to running a globally recognized creative studio, Kristy Campbell is living proof that embracing your weirdness can lead to wild success. In this episode of CAPTN OffScript, Kristy shares how she turned a 100-day design challenge into Pink...
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
There's a version of the creative career conversation that almost never gets recorded.Not the award acceptance. Not the process breakdown. Not the polished origin story where every setback was secretly a setup. That version exists everywhere. This isn't that.CAPTN OffScript is where designers, founders, illustrators, and makers sit down and talk about what's actually going on — the fear before the pivot, the year where the work dried up, the identity crisis that came with success, the moment they almost stopped, and what kept them moving. The messy, honest, deeply human side of building a creative life.I'm Alen. I run a one-person type foundry called SilverStag Type, and I've been working in and around the design industry long enough to know what gets edited out of most interviews. I started this show because I was tired of highlight reels dressed up as conversations. I wanted to hear what creative people actually think — about money and meaning, about burnout and reinvention, about
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CAPTN OffScript
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does CAPTN OffScript have?
CAPTN OffScript currently has 84 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is CAPTN OffScript about?
There's a version of the creative career conversation that almost never gets recorded.Not the award acceptance. Not the process breakdown. Not the polished origin story where every setback was secretly a setup. That version exists everywhere. This isn't that.CAPTN OffScript is where designers,...
How often does CAPTN OffScript release new episodes?
CAPTN OffScript has 84 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.
Where can I listen to CAPTN OffScript?
You can listen to CAPTN OffScript on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts CAPTN OffScript?
CAPTN OffScript is created and hosted by CAPTN OffScript.
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