Durban to Berg Cartographic Map Art

Each 34 Degrees Design map begins with sourced geographic and elevation data. The terrain is built from GIS and NASA SRTM elevation data, processed in ArcGIS Pro and then developed by hand into its final expression. Contours, height ranges, hillshade and colour are not left as default GIS output. They are chosen and adjusted by eye so that the landscape reads as it does in life, from snow and pale high ground through brown rocky slopes to greener low-lying country and the transitions along the coast.

Further layers are then added individually from authoritative sources, including OpenStreetMap shapefiles and other GIS datasets: roads, highways, railways, settlements, water, boundaries, route markings and infrastructure. Each layer is balanced manually against terrain, hillshade and contours, so that no single layer overwhelms the composition, human infrastructure stays legible without flattening the landscape, and the terrain remains visible even across dense urban areas.

Typography, place names and route labels are researched and positioned by hand, placed for readability without obscuring the geographic and human patterns beneath them. Every work is resolved to read clearly both at close range and from across a room.

The original master artworks are produced at Flagship scale, approximately two metres across, and the A1 Editions are derived from those large-format originals. Each master takes weeks, and sometimes close to a month, to resolve, because placement, hierarchy, colour, terrain, line weight and annotation are curated by eye and by hand. The work is authored by the founder, an urban planner and cartographer.