With the amount of people on Tik Tok, I’m sure some of you have seen the now famous State Tree Map, created by Justin Davies. One morning after seeing one of the very first states made, I looked into the account more and started to follow his journey. A few months after continuously watching all his videos, I decided to reach out and ask if he would be interested in an interview with me. He said yes and the interview went a little something like this:
Zelia: Starting off with some lighter questions, what’s the coolest tree you’ve ever seen?
Justin: That’s a hard question for me to answer because I always feel like a million rush into my brain at once, but the one that comes immediately to mind for sentimental reasons is the Utah Juniper Tree. Last year right after I quit my job to try and do my own thing, I took some time to go down and wander in the desert. I went to a spot called the San Rafael Swell, and just happened to come upon this old Utah Juniper, and it wasn’t different from the other trees but I felt drawn to it and I climbed up in it and just sat there. With no water around in the middle of the desert, it was alive and thriving, and I had this moment with this tree and I could justify all my so-called sudden or rash decisions.
The answer he gave me to such a simple question was really touching. It really showed how everything fell into place and how his whole business started. Justin went on to talk about how he wasn’t sure if he was an artist, but he described that while he was sitting barefoot in this tree alone in the middle of the desert, he felt that that tree was an artist, and he could be too. This tree was an insanely powerful motivator for him that it helped him to really push into his career in art and to just be himself.
I then asked about his favourite type of wood, and he replied with mountain mahogany. This was the tree that helped him and his gateway into woodworking. Although his favourite type of wood is specific, he does not have a favourite type of tree:
“I struggle with favourites in general, and this is a broad answer but I like range native trees, which is what I named my little business after. I like trees that exist within their native range, and that’s ultimately what I’m drawn to and curious about.”
Z: What made you decide to do a State Tree Map?
J: It’s something I’ve wanted to do for a while. I always wanted a map made out of trees that were native to each state for a long time — pretty quickly after I got into woodworking. I started woodworking due to a curiosity about trees, and specifically the native trees to Utah and my area, which snowballed into a larger country wide curiosity. I’ve always loved maps as well, ever since I was a young kid I loved just staring at maps and pouring over them. I never got around to it because I wanted to use a CNC* machine since I wanted all the states to be perfect, but once I got over that fear and freehanded them, it added more character into the piece. Being on TikTok had me looking for more content to create, and I finally just started the map.
During the process of this whole project, Justin admitted he never thought it would get this much attention online. I asked if he expected this to get so famous and his reply was a truthful burst of emotion:
“Absolutely not! Before the map I had grown a following of about 200,000-300,000 people, and that already blew me away. What I did not expect was the State Tree Series to reach such an audience to where I’m getting 1,000,000 views, and now I’m reaching that many followers.”
This range of popularity was something he never expected to happen, and his reaction to his first video with a million likes was something that was amazing for him to experience:
“I remember just thinking ‘HOLY BANANAS!’ because that’s such a huge goal to reach.”
Nearing the end of the interview, I had only one more question I was dying to know about the state tree project. “If you could, would you change anything about how you did this project?” was the question burning a hole in the back of my mind, and here’s what Justin had to say about that:
J: The only thing I would change is further dedicating time towards the project. I wish that I had the ability to really sit down and dedicate every day of every week to work on this project, but unfortunately, I just don’t work like that. I wish I moved quicker on monetizing it so I could focus on it even more, and it’s kind of a bummer, but it’s the way the world works. We live in a society where you have to have money to do stuff. Each state takes a full day, if not more, to make the state, film it, create the videos and everything for the TikTok process videos. Having more time really would have sped up the process and made it better for me as I would have enjoyed the process more.
This interview was an insane opportunity that really opened my eyes to the world of woodworking, and how it feels to be in someone like Justin’s shoes. The process is so meticulous and detailed and I personally cannot wait to watch the rest of the states be made. I hope this article piqued some peoples’ interest in trees — more specifically state trees, and got them to check out the State Tree Map. As always, remember that there is no Planet B, and we need to care for our Earth now while we still have a chance!
*CNC machines are machine tools that cut or move material as programmed on the controller.