Benjamin joined the Solidarity FabLab Kellefabrik in Dijon when he was 24 years old and made a fresh start there:
The theoretical teaching at school was never good for me, even if I’ve always been interested in lots of things. I wanted to create and needed to practise to learn. Without a diploma, I tried the trade of landscaper, then electrician, but it quickly became routine. After long months abroad, back in Dijon, I found myself out of work, lonely, with no means : odd jobs, unpaid internships...
Fortunately, the Local Mission helped me benefit from the Garantie Jeunes programme with a 1-month internship in dijon’s solidarity FabLab unknown territory for me...
I had a good time, I learned a lot and now I draw a salary and have a two-year contract with the FabLab, where I support projects and teams !
At KelleFabrik, I’ve discovered lots of things ! Of course I learned the basics of programming, electronics, using 3D machines, but above all I discovered a philosophy, sharing, the freedom to touch everything, and exchanges with different and passionate people.
At the FabLab, you can make a thousand things and instead of feeling lonely, you help each other build something, you learn from each other: teenage interns, pensioners, start-ups, comedians, electronics engineers, designers, curious people... they’re all passionate and altruistic. We look for things together, we share skills, it’s anything but routine. We’re all interested in this new vision of work based on mutual assistance, this new manufacturing economy, this ethic that goes against programmed obsolescence.
In addition, when I go to other cities I’ll visit their FabLabs to meet the teams.
And in the future? I don’t know but at any rate I’ve learned the trade of project manager which consists in putting good skills together and supporting the technical and human operation of different projects and I like it!
