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Get ready for a refreshing dive into the world of architectural illustrations with our next guest – Augustine Coll
Curated content, insights and opportunities to accelerate your career in Architecture, Design, Development and Real Estate to the next level.
Frames and Facades, ft. Augustine Coll
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[00:00:00]
Stephen Drew: Hello everyone. An afternoon special, four o'clock. Don't worry if you're tuning in live. I won't tell the boss. Maybe you're self-employed and you can be the master of your own domain. Who knows? 30 seconds. We'll go live. You wanna get your pencils for this one? Get your illustration. I'm not very good, but my guest is 15 seconds.
We'll go.
Hello everyone. Welcome to an afternoon livestream. Special goodness knows where you're watching. LinkedIn, YouTube, replay. Who knows? Who cares? [00:01:00] I'm joined by a fantastic guest today, one that can draw a lot better than me in my childhood. Before when I wanted to become an Architect, I would have scribbles down.
I would do all this crazy stuff, and I would draw buildings and think one day that's what I want to be. I almost got there. However, what I've learnt is that there are some artists and architects that do a lot better hand drawing than me. And also I think it's really important to embrace artists that maybe haven't qualified as an Architect, but have a profound impact within the Architecture industry.
And on that note, I've got an amazing guest who I actually drank a few beers with. I met in person before twisting their arm. To get them on the live stream to talk about this awesome subject. So I've got the fantastic Augustine Cole. How are you sir? Are you okay?
Agustin Coll: I am good. Thank you, Steve. You didn't twist my arm at all. It's a pleasure to be here. Thank you so much for inviting me onto your [00:02:00] podcast. It's great. So yeah, I'm happy to be here.
Stephen Drew: Brilliant.
Agustin Coll: yeah.
Stephen Drew: There we go. So what I'll do, you're the master of the pens and pencils, and I am the master of chatting rubbish lives. So don't worry, I'll walk you through this. Augustine, so anyone that hasn't met you, tell me a little bit about yourself, that your art, your artistry. Give us a little preview about who you are and what you currently doing, and then we can unpack it from there.
Agustin Coll: My name is Augustin and I'm an Illustrator and artist. I have an interest in Architecture and more, more broadly, curious about the narrative and expressive capacity of Architecture and this translates into characters. I like to create characters from buildings and the built environment.
Stephen Drew: Nice,
Agustin Coll: in
Stephen Drew: so
Agustin Coll: I want to talk about the history, the identity, and the changing nature [00:03:00] of the build environment.
Stephen Drew: Very cool. I, the, one of the beauties of doing a live stream is that I've got your website, I put the link up now and people can get an idea into the wacky and crazy world, and you've got a PowerPoint, which you're gonna show a little bit later of a bit inside the details. But we're gonna keep that for a little bit because I want these viewers to stay with us.
So if you are watching this live stream, You've got to stay with us for at least 10 minutes before you get all that juicy info. In the meantime though, if we were to look at your website, Augustine, so it seems to me that you've got these crazy, quirky, kooky characters, which are actually buildings, right?
You wanna walk us through when you started doing this or where it came from? Or maybe you want to talk about this building? Who knows?
Agustin Coll: This one in particular b is part of my Architectural drawing series. Which is what I've been doing lately. They look a [00:04:00] bit like drawings like elevations, but they combine, I like to combine them with plans and cross sections in, in, into one image in order to create this character.
So if you were to, if you saw this like past glance from the distance, you'd think it's just another. Architectural drawing, but
Stephen Drew: Mm.
Agustin Coll: get closer, I and that's what I like about doing these is that you, you start noticing, what's that? Is that line looks like an arm and that other line, like a leg and then is that a eye?
And then there's this, yeah. You start seeing these like character alive in the drawing.
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: And or, or that's what I want people to, to experience.
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: me if it works.
Stephen Drew: I like it. I this gentleman to me looks like a very regal, very experienced character who's what? Watering a little tree here. I'll [00:05:00] click on another one as well, but they're quite very, they're quite, Fun, aren't they? Is that like one of the qualities that you have as well? Cause you talked about like the subtle nature of could it be a building and then it's a character and you can see the eyes and stuff.
But part of it is it also a bit playful in your words then?
Agustin Coll: Yeah, it has to be. I mean I, it's I like the the juxtaposition of something that is boring technical drawing. I was. Terrible, a technical drawing in school. And guess it is a way to make it more fun and more more, bring it into my, the world I'm comfortable in
Stephen Drew: Mm
Agustin Coll: follow the rules of, the really proper technical drawing.
And then, yeah, they, all of them are hand.
Every, I'm sure that all of the architects that want to remain sane out there, they are using cat, right? But I'm not I'm drawing these by hand. And they can be quite big. They're the [00:06:00] ones you've shown. They like a two. So they are size a two, quite big half a meter
Stephen Drew: My goodness. I'm just scrolling through your website. It's an awful lot in a good way. In a good way, not a bad way of these sketches. And so another thing I think that's important to, to know, w what seems to me, so these are not projects from the imagination, right? They're actual. They're imaginative, but they're also real places, real buildings of Architecture.
Was that deliberate Augustino something that you started doing and realized that you enjoyed bringing characters to physical buildings of the real world?
Agustin Coll: I, this exploration is a huge part of my work.
Stephen Drew: so.
Agustin Coll: that's the real world out there. And London in particular a, an amazing source of inspiration. And when I draw [00:07:00] a building, this one, for example, was a commission. I go and if I can obviously see it by myself, take tons of photos and learn about the history of the place.
And yeah basically all of that goes into the artwork. Yeah, like being there in the, on the spot is huge part of it. yeah. And then obviously there's a personal element I of my own experience yeah, it's a combination between the Rio and the imagined and the whimsical and surreal,
Stephen Drew: yeah, I think so. I quite like though the technical drawing pen, which is very Architectural. Even though he touched upon computers now, but anyone that studies Architecture ha gets technical pens and has to do with those drawings and What was it like when you first had to start using that medium compared to, for [00:08:00] example, I don't know, charcoal or anything else?
Was that very deliberate?
Agustin Coll: Oh yeah. Yeah. It's, as you said, was I wanted it to look like an a, like an Architectural drawing. Like an Architect
Stephen Drew: Yeah,
Agustin Coll: it. You maybe I, deranged architects.
Stephen Drew: a deranged. Yeah.
Agustin Coll: Yeah, I, this is one of my influences, for example Is the work of Avantgarde Architectural groups. Maybe some people out there must have, I hope they have thought of the work of Agram
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: when they've seen this for the first time. But they, yeah, that's a huge part of, what brought me to making these.
And yeah, like bringing in the tools of the trades was. A huge part of of the fun of doing this. So yeah I'm a professional Illustrator as well when I'm not doing this. So yeah, I'm used to inking using, pen [00:09:00] for inking and the like, so yeah it's a medium I'm used to,
Stephen Drew: Very interesting, I think as well. While we were here, I had one or two comments come in from Syrian who says, let's go. So getting a bit of energy coming in here, now's a chance that it's maybe if you're an Architectural professional, you can ask Augustine a few questions, whether it's about his passion or about technique, but maybe you can borrow pillage and steal those ideas while he's here.
Because he will be gone maybe in 30 minutes. Who knows? So maybe, obviously, I thought maybe we'll be cool now cause I can keep browsing your website forever.
Agustin Coll: Mm-hmm.
Stephen Drew: have a quick look at that presentation that you wanted to do. So maybe we can briskly go through it. So not like a formal presentation, but you can maybe let us in to that crazy avantgarde mind of yours as you put it earlier.
Agustin Coll: So yeah I, this is just a sample of the Architectural drawings I was talking about [00:10:00] earlier the ones I've been doing over the last couple of years. And as I said, I like to. Turn character buildings into characters also places. And for example what you see here, the one here on the left where's no Wood cemetery which is very much a place rather than a, like one specific building.
Stephen Drew: Yep.
Agustin Coll: And yeah to create a character out of a whole place of the size of that, I. This was, I did this, most of my work is self-initiated. And in this case, I wanted I'd been meaning to do a piece on cemeteries because, I like cemeteries. And this is one of the seven magnificent, the, the Victorian cemeteries built in around London in the 19th century.
So yeah I went to the place took lots of photos. It's also near me based in South London. So yeah, it's a short walk away from where I live and [00:11:00] yeah. It's obviously not a kind of realistic it's not a, how can I say, like two size recreation of the place, but more like an abstraction.
Stephen Drew: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. Show us your next slide. Cause I can see a bit of color there. I'm dying to see what's on page number two.
Agustin Coll: Oh
Stephen Drew: Mm.
Agustin Coll: so I was gonna say my work takes many shapes and so I, I'm not doing this quite as much anymore. But colage is also a huge part of my work. And you can see it here. I like to Combine, photo cutouts. And yeah, use a pen, tablet. This is more digital, obviously entirely digital.
But yeah, draw arms and legs onto your buildings yeah bring the character out. in this case you can see it's the Barbie again.
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: This [00:12:00] illustration got me an nomination for an a OI illustration award some time ago, and it was featured in the now Defund Mark Magazine.
Stephen Drew: Yeah, I've, I liked that magazine. It was brilliant, wasn't it? it happened?
Agustin Coll: I don't know, I just, I think they just discontinued it. Maybe no one was reading it.
Stephen Drew: Oh my goodness. Yeah, I did stop reading it after I stopped working in Architecture, but when I did watch it, it was good. But that's amazing. We actually had a question come in Augustine, while we're here saying from surgeon who says those drawings are fantastic, Augustine, may I ask, what programs do you use for oops, excuse me, digitalization.
There you go.
Agustin Coll: Thank you. The, I use mainly Photoshop yeah. I sometimes Illustrator, but most of the time, 98% of the time would be Photoshop. Yeah,
Stephen Drew: You're,
Agustin Coll: my own [00:13:00] photos I try to use my own footage if possible.
Stephen Drew: yeah. Wow.
Agustin Coll: yeah.
Stephen Drew: You're like a purist. No, no AI involved so far, Augustine, is that right?
Agustin Coll: I know you, you have a thing for AI and yeah I, AI is a fascinating if kind of scary subject for me. But no, I don't use it. I guess that's, Yeah, if I learned all these skills and if I can do it myself, I will do it myself.
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: yeah, people who can't draw and, why not?
Obviously they can create their own art. We, using whatever tools they have available, that's fine.
Stephen Drew: Yeah. Okay. I'll tell you what. Can I ask a quick question? So a quick one minute round, you mentioned that AI is a complicated topic for you. What are your initial thoughts in it then? Are you against using ai? Because I imagine as well, cuz mid journey and all that stuff's getting pretty [00:14:00] advanced, right? So as an Illustrator I'm, I imagine you'd have mixed emotions.
That's what I about it truly.
Agustin Coll: Yeah I can, I was in this like birthday party recently and of the, one of the guests there after, he asked me what I do and when I mentioned that I was an Illustrator he immediately brought up the subject of AI and he said, look, it's the you're gonna be out of out of work very soon, mate.
And
Stephen Drew: Mm-hmm.
Agustin Coll: the second thing he said to me that evening. So I was quite shocked to hear that. But he
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: the me journey. And I was really impressed, to be honest. But I'm not sure. Yeah, it's all down to, I've been hearing all these stories about, the work of artists being used without their permission to feed these ai.
And
Stephen Drew: exactly.
Agustin Coll: a lot of like controversy that needs to [00:15:00] be like dealt with before this becomes a real thing. it's already real. It's real,
Stephen Drew: Oh, it's not going anywhere. But then I think architects can be worried about will AI replace an Architect? My view is that it's a tool to be used. It never can replicate the full part of a job, nor I think, nor do I think AI will replace an Illustrator.
However, it's quite susceptible on the first.
Iteration, right? You're like, oh my goodness, look how good it is. But like everything, you have to direct things, right? And that's what being an Illustrator is. You're constantly redirecting, surely the drawing as you go. Whereas I think AI is very good at just, plummeting out if you initial ideas and then you have to mold it into what you want.
But don't let me. Rabbit it on about it anymore. I don't think you need to be worried about your [00:16:00] qua being stolen by the algorithm and may, and maybe on that note, show us a little bit more of your qua. What's on slide number three?
Agustin Coll: Slight is number three. So
Stephen Drew: Mm.
Agustin Coll: I, another line of my work, and this is what I'm, I try to do, I've been doing this a bit more recently, but there cartoons when I say that I'm interested in the kind of narrative capacity of Architecture, I quite, I read the news a lot and I like if I see I can react to a piece of news with, these Architectural characters, then I like to have a go at it
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: I like to, make it more simple than these Architectural drawings you saw.
Yeah I used a black pen and kind of try to get this done in one day or, a few hours. It
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: it's all about more like the joke. So yeah, the first one I did was for but was on, on [00:17:00] the storming of Capitol Hill on the 6th of January. I did one on the, the recent like death of Rafael Vin Lee,
Stephen Drew: Yes.
Agustin Coll: the guy who did the the
Stephen Drew: Yeah. And he burned the cars with the reflection. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Very cool. I like it. These are quite funny, aren't they? I quite, they're quite comic comical. I wonder as an Architect of the building ever commented yet, or has he slipped under the radar so far? Augustine?
Agustin Coll: No, I think this one the one of the walkie-talkie you see here, I think it got a, like from, his, is it, I'm not sure His name is John Oam, but I think he, he gave me a which was a huge compliment.
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: OAM is the surname for sure. I'm not sure about his name, but yeah. He makes these post modern, very colorful buildings and he's wor he's got one on the alley of dogs right by the river.
Stephen Drew: I think you, [00:18:00] I think that was the next candidate for the next cartoon perhaps. And then you can tweet it at him. On that note though. So can I ask, have you collaborated with an Architect yet?
Agustin Coll: Actually no, I don't think I have. I've Uh, I dunno. buying my work and a co, a commission. I'm not sure an Architect has commissioned work for me, but I've had therapists and yeah. No, I
Stephen Drew: Hmm,
Agustin Coll: I have collaborated directly with an Architect. It'd be cool. waiting.
Stephen Drew: you're waiting. You're here and I will put up the website again. If anyone wants to collaborate with you, they just reach out, right? I'm sure.
Agustin Coll: You're an Architect, aren't you?
Stephen Drew: I used to be a part two. You can't, I can't say I'm legally an Architect. Yeah, the, in the public, some people could sometimes get confused about what is an Architectural?
Assistant, Architectural designer. An Architect, [00:19:00] Architectural Assistant can sound like I'm holding pens up to an Architect. But basically I did five years out of the seven years before setting up the Architecture so I'm a little bit of a black sheep as well. But going back to your artwork for a second.
Okay. So I'm interested to know, now you do got all these doodles and stuff. Do you ever see yourself doing something different or if you, are you here to stay in the Architectural illustration building space?
Agustin Coll: I to be honest I do quite a lot like, so I'm a freelance storyboard artist outside of here when I'm not doing my Architectural drawings and yeah, I. I do work for Design Studios doing I think more than study boards, you'd call them user journey illustrations scenarios, persona designs.
And I am [00:20:00] trying to break into the animation world as well. I, last year I had a project I could create Be selected by the B C
Stephen Drew: Yep.
Agustin Coll: part of the Ignite Development Scheme. So is that scheme for, developing animation ips. And for a few months my colleague Mark and I were working with them.
He's also a welshman by the way,
Stephen Drew: Oh,
Agustin Coll: so
Stephen Drew: is that a good thing or a bad thing?
Agustin Coll: it is, I think it's a very good thing.
Stephen Drew: Yes. There we go. I I will not disagree with you. I am absolutely fascinated by your work. Now, a lot of the audience will also be, maybe they found this because they're interested in the work and then they can engage with you, but equally, a lot of architects might be interested in the Architectural illustration.
And you've got a lot of tips, I'm sure. Knocking around, you've got a lot of experiences that you've done. So are there for someone that's starting to get into [00:21:00] doing fine technical drawing, do you have any tips or headaches that they can avoid?
Agustin Coll: Whoa. I think, gosh advice for people starting,
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: I say stick to your guns and well experiment. Try to have fun.
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: But at the same time, try to stay true to kind of core values that you have to figure out for yourself.
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: And also, I don't know, in my, what's worked for me is to keep the thing open-ended in, in my case, you can see this, the work I was doing at the beginning when I started this was, is very different to what I'm doing now.
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: part of the journey. I couldn't tell you. Like I, it's not that I planned it or, and just, put it out there and see what happens. I was, [00:22:00] I'm quite late at putting it out there myself.
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: this for a few years as a side thing and now I feel more confident to.
Putting it out there and having it seen by some people. But I guess that you have to wait till you feel ready and not everyone is
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: same
Stephen Drew: I think so. I think you're right. I love it. I think it's got a very playful nature. Now, Augustine, I'm aware that you've got some artwork on show, right? Is your exhibition still open at the moment?
Agustin Coll: Oh yeah. That it's it's on at curious du the Curious Du Gallery in Peckham.
Stephen Drew: Okay.
Agustin Coll: On until the first week of June, like the, until the 4th of June. And it's called Frames and Facades. And it's a show I'm doing with another South London artist called Arena All Over who's, yeah, who, whose work is very different from [00:23:00] mine, but the fan of it.
And what the galla liked and wanted for this show. But yeah, Irina is doing this takes on contemporary myths and she likes to explore the, the myths have evolved from the kind of like early, like the age of classic cinema to our days.
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: like blends that with, Religious Ima imagery from her native Russia. She's from Moscow, she's been living in London for a very long time. She's got a family and, so she's very much British. So yeah, and then my work is there as well, a selection of my Architectural drawings mainly.
Yeah, if you want to take a journey through, my, strange London Architecture, go there and have a look.
Stephen Drew: There you go. I think people should check it out. I do need to pop down as well. [00:24:00] Pca. I'm not too far from the, so I need to get the bus right and check it out. And I will do, what's the final date of it? Open Augustine?
Agustin Coll: Okay. Don't wait till then, please. no. Yeah, the, so it's been extended until the 4th of June, right? yeah. So it was gonna be just a for May only, but can see it till you have until the 4th of June, 5:00 PM.
Stephen Drew: I will try to get down before that, but if anyone's watching this and they want to check out the weird and wonderful work of Augustine, then they can find it in Pham. In the, what did you say? The curio Gar Gallery.
Agustin Coll: It is called Curious Oo.
Stephen Drew: My goodness. That is a tongue twister for me as a Welsh person. Curios. Oo, my
goodness. Yeah.
Got it in.
Agustin Coll: sorry. Yeah it's difficult for me as well.
Stephen Drew: We'll get there. I think it's really interesting your work, and I'm gonna put your [00:25:00] website up again. Now, if anyone in the audience wants to ask one or two quick questions before we go, they can, but Augustine you are here. Is that, maybe you have one or two things to ask me.
It could be, was I hungover after we met? It was okay, but I was a bit ropey. Or it could be about the Architecture. Social. It could be about anything really. Is there or the Architecture industry, who knows? Or do you have a question for me?
Agustin Coll: I I think I do. What's if, if you had your own Architecture practice, what kind of buildings would you be? Would you be, creating kind of Architecture do you like,
Stephen Drew: My goodness. That is a very specific question, a very interesting question. I was always ex obsessed with experimental and you caught me in, you caught me. So I'll give you my honest answer. I was always interested in work like Jason Brus or Light. Theatrical exhibition design, kinetic [00:26:00] exhibition, stuff like that.
So who knows? But I ended up actually working at a practice called EPR and I would work on large scale residential buildings, which is quite cool. So I needed to go down to Onesworth cuz I was involved in, one of the projects I was involved in was called the Ram Brewery, which was a, a big old abandoned brewery, which used to.
But I don't know. I used to brew all these ones with beers, so I think that would be a cool one to see. So yeah, I mean that the reality and the ideas, who knows? But now I don't do either. I do something completely different. I talk on LinkedIn for a living, and there you go. It's not a bad existence.
It's very different, but there you go.
Agustin Coll: Architecture is part of it, and that's what that's what matters, right?
Stephen Drew: Yeah, exactly. Maybe I've got a sketch around you somewhere, but it will not be nearly as good as yours. I'll tell you one quick thing before we go, and I'll be really honest. I nearly failed my first Architectural drawing course in [00:27:00] university. The teacher told me I had to do it again and you were laugh because I was drawing with a pencil instead of a fine line, and the whole assignment was on about Doing the technical drawing and I was doing the pencil and all this stuff, so I got like a big fat fail and I had to resubmit it, and then I just about passed.
But in other modules I was better. But in technical drawing, I was very bad. Who knows? Maybe I unfortunately do not have a career as an Architectural Illustrator. But we'll just have to see what happens. And I do not think that me saying random words on, on chat, G p t or mid Journey is going to replace an Illustrator.
But yeah, there we go. I think on. On that? No, we haven't had any questions come in, but Augustine, I think it's absolutely amazing what you're gonna, what you're doing. I'm gonna bring up your website one quick last time so that everyone can look at it. And if you were listening to the audio version of this, you'll probably check out the video version on our YouTube [00:28:00] channel because this is quite a visual discussion.
And you can check out all of Augustine's work on his website, which is www dot. Augustine with an E, which is the English way of doing the name Augustine or a u g u s t i n e, and then surname carl C o l l.com. And you can reach out to him there. Is that right Augustine?
Agustin Coll: It is, right? Yeah. Sorry for that confusing spelling, but
Stephen Drew: No, it's
okay.
Agustin Coll: It's the story behind it, as I mentioned,
Stephen Drew: Yeah.
Agustin Coll: my English. teacher back in, in high school calling me yeah, I'm from Barcelona in case the audience. Were wondering. But yeah, I had a native English teacher and she, yeah, she started calling me that to the school and of my classmates and.
I came to, when I came to the UK [00:29:00] in 2008, I thought, okay, I want to be understood. Let's just use this. There you go. stoke stuck.
Stephen Drew: Yeah, so Augustin Augustine, as long as people are calling you and ideally getting commissions you will reply. Thank you so much. On that note, I'm really app appreciate you being here. I didn't put my soundboard on, but I'll give you a clap. I really appreciate you being here. I'm gonna end the live stream now, Augustine, and thank you so much for tuning in.
I do have as well a bit of a surprise tonight as well. If you're around at seven o'clock, there will be live hostings where people will be talking about. Why you should vote for them in the upcoming RIBA lecture. And so stay tuned because it's gonna get spicy. Could get slightly controversial. Who knows?
Depends on what you guys and the audience ask. But
Agustin Coll: mm.
Stephen Drew: now, it's been a lovely calm livestream. So Augustine, stay on the stage. I'm gonna end the livestream here. And thank you so much for [00:30:00] everyone in the audience for being here. Take
care. See you.
soon. Bye-bye.
Agustin Coll: I thank you.