The Wildlife Conservation Society and Markly Boyer have created a series of visualizations depicting the island of Manhattan prior to development. 3D Nature’s Visual Nature Studio software was instrumental in making the historical depictions come to life. The October issue of
The New Yorker Magazine includes an article about the Mannahatta Project. These images will also appear in several museum exhibits.

According to the WCS, “The aim of the Mannahatta Project is to reconstruct the ecology of Manhattan when Henry Hudson first sailed by in 1609 and compare it to what we know of the island today. The Mannahatta Project will help us to understand, down to the level of one city block, where in Manhattan streams once flowed or where American Chestnuts may have grown, where black bears once marked territories, and where the Lenape fished and hunted. Most history books dispense of the pre-European history of New York in only a few pages. However, with new methods in geographic analysis and the help of a remarkable 18th-century map, we will discover a new aspect of New York culture, the environmental foundation of the city.”

Visual Nature Studio has been used in historical recreations the world over. A recent example is a map of the historic trail used by the original group to summit the Himalayan peak, K2, created by Marco Gualdrini of Italy.


Please Note: Mannahatta Project is the correct spelling of the project. Please do not spell correct this.