Watch as Japan’s surplus trees are transformed into forest-tinted crayons

Following Japan’s efforts to rebuild after the devastation of the Second World War, roughly 70 per cent of the country’s land is now covered in trees – more than double the average of countries around the world. Today, the rise of the global supply chain means most commercial wood is imported from abroad. This has left Japan with ‘basically way too much wood’, as the UK artist Dan Coppen puts it in this short from the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. The video highlights a project by Coppen and his creative partner, the Japanese artist Saki Maruyama, who together form the design and art duo Playfool, to repurpose trees in inventive ways.

Participating in a residency programme funded by the Japanese Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, the pair ultimately created a set of ‘forest crayons’ fashioned from the wood of a variety of Japanese trees. They hope their invention will help users ‘cultivate a closer relationship with forests’ that surround them. The project is, of course, not a practical plan for the nation’s overabundance of trees. However, Playfool’s creation shows how ingenuity of resources can yield surprising results that, depicted here, double as an exceptionally enjoyable watch.