18 Oct Community Welcome: Joaquim Melchor
We’re delighted to speak to new CLOCK Sector Expert Joaquim Melchor from Malaga, Spain. Joaquim is a true innovator in his field of modern architecture combining old and new traditions to produce consumer goods, unique works and limited collections for nautical and terrestrial architecture, art and industrial design. He spoke with us about his innovation, his determination to keep ancient skills alive and why he believes peer learning is the future.
Hi Joaquim. Tell us about the work you do.
So, the common thread of my thirty-three years of experience has been the manipulation of natural raw material for different professional contexts in restoration, conditioning and new manufacturing of unique works. Essentially, what I do is use traditional restoration methods. Over the last ten years, I have taken all my knowledge of individual traditional methods and began to combine them all on new construction projects. I’m mixing traditional empirical knowledge with modern technology such as laser cutting. This innovation has led me to work in nautical design in the northern lakes of Europe, terrestrial architecture, and the repair of traditional wells throughout continental Europe. I work with the old masters of these ancient skills every day so that their knowledge isn’t lost. I’m one of the few carrying out this work, so it is quite innovative. I’m also professor and director at the KS Academy where we run workshops to keep these traditions alive.
What is the KS Academy?
I feel obligated to demonstrate everything I say about these ancient skills. In the factory, I take people into a workshop where I run the KS academy. At the academy, we focus on how to create things with natural matter. I teach people how to use these traditional skills and how to make prototypes of products with them. The teaching concept is ‘learning by doing’.
‘Learning by doing’ fits perfectly with the CLOCK ethos. How did you discover CLOCK?
Before the 2008 financial crisis, I planned to complete some form of professional certification on a project I was working on, but that disappeared incredibly quickly. Fast forward to now when a friend involved in my industry in Malaga told me about it! I investigated immediately and signed up as soon as I could.
I am entirely self-taught so not only has the Level 7 Sector Expert qualification helped give my clients more confidence when contracting me, the peer learning experience is unparalleled too. I think peer learning is the future of learning. The whole process helped me recognise the structure of my professional life. It helped me to sort through a very complex web of knowledge and showed me how to untangle that and isolate my own working strengths. If I had CLOCK at the beginning of my career, I would have been able to maximise my working methods and structure from day one of my working life.
What would you say is the most valuable aspect of CLOCK?
Meeting other professionals like me was a huge bonus. Learning different perspectives from other countries about issues in their field was fascinating. The social ways to implement my knowledge in the market are very varied. CLOCK helps you to convey your skills effectively to other working professionals. Also, the opportunity to have conversations with other creative industry professionals was eye-opening. It can help you shift your perspective in a very dynamic way.
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