Tourist Trap

A long time ago, a bunch of old, Ancient Greek historians decided to write about the Seven Ancient Wonders of the World. Together, they created what could be considered the world’s first travel reviews, compiling lists of the greatest feats of human achievement while simultaneously bragging about the amazing holidays they’d been on.

Unfortunately for them, most of the Wonders on that list aren’t still standing. The only one we can still visit today is the Great Pyramids at Giza, and they’re just big triangles, really.

But who needs boring old Ancient Wonders when you can check out the work of experienced Minecraft builder, Boorizz? Following a long history of building beautiful, detailed architectural delights, his latest project, 7 Wonders of Paleponos, will blow you away.

The map was built as an entry for a competition with the theme ‘Human Achievement’, but Boorizz wasn’t satisfied with just copying illustrations and mock-ups of what the Seven Wonders might have looked like. Instead, he designed his own, based on architecture from all over the world (because the Seven Ancient Wonders list is pretty much limited to wherever the Greeks could sail to - which misses out Asia, North and South America, most of Africa and a lot of Europe). He then crammed them all into a big circle, so there’s no need to travel around the world to tick them off your bucket list. Thanks, Boorizz!

“I got inspired by the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World,” says Boorizz, calling these Wonders “great realisations that show the potential of our species.”

Given that these wonders are supposed to be the greatest things that humans have ever built, it was quite a challenge to recreate them using nothing but cubes. “These structures are at the same time artistic and highly technical,” Boorizz admits.

“There are extra difficulties when it comes to the balance and the proportions of what you are creating. But with details, you need to make sure that the result has to be nice from a close point of view, as well as from far away. All these details then obviously have to work together so that the structure as a whole looks good.”

To make it even more of a challenge, Boorizz’s building technique is not only incredibly detailed (check out the marbling on that triumphal arch and that Eye of Horus on top of the pyramid) but also achieved without the use of references - “I rarely ever use pictures as inspiration,” he admits. “I only took a look at a few pictures when I had serious doubts about one specific aspect. I try instead to represent an idea and express myself through building.”

But what are these lovely fantasy Wonders, exactly? Let’s take a closer look.

In the centre, representing the Ancient Wonders, there’s the ‘Pyramid of Kheops’, the Hanging Gardens, and a temple, which Boorizz says is a reference to “the temples you could see back in ancient Greece, like the temple of Artemis, which is actually one of the original seven wonders.”

The colonnades around the temple are a reference to St Peter’s Square in the Vatican City - that’s the one where the Pope does his big speeches. “This monument in particular is one of my favourites,” says Boorizz.

“Around all that, a pre-historical structure similar to the Stonehenge can be seen,” Boorizz adds. “I consider the Stonehenge to be a symbol of the very basis of architecture.” Covering the architectural ages from prehistoric to modern - which he achieved by adding a skyscraper inspired by Dubai’s Burj Khalifa - was Boorizz’s idea of ‘Human Achievement’. Not one achievement, but the entire span of achievement, ever since we picked up tools.

But one of the modern Wonders of the World made it into Boorizz’s build, too. “Another really imposing structure that I took inspiration from is the Great Wall of China.” You can see the wall on one side of the build, where it forms the main entrance. “What makes this wall a great human achievement is the fact that it took ages to be made and lots of dedication which granted it the status of longest structure in the world.” The real-world Great Wall is 5,500 miles long, and was built to keep out invaders. You might have heard it can be seen from space with the naked eye, but sadly that ‘fact’ isn’t true. Sorry, budding astronauts.

Boorizz has one last thing to say to anyone considering taking on a mammoth build like this one: “Whether you are ambitious or not, aim for something small at the beginning. One of the most important parts is to make sure that the scale of what you are trying to make is appropriate. It is easier to master something small.”

Boorizz’s build ticks so many boxes that if it actually existed in real life, it would be expensive, dirty, and packed with tourists, so it’s probably for the best that it doesn’t. This way, we can appreciate this beautiful re-imagining of millennia of human achievement without even having to get off our backsides. Isn’t the future wonderful?

Renders by Iskillia, Killerack, TerrorQ, and Antrelial