A talented artist has made a stunningly accurate to-scale model of Manhattan using nothing by trash.
Zayd Menk’s incredibly intricate creation is made from materials including discarded computer chips, fans, broken mobile phones, and an array of batteries.
The project took Menk, 17, more than three months to build, with each skyscraper created to a specific 0.0635:100 scale.
In total, the Zimbabwe-born artist used 263 hot glue sticks, 11 CPUs, 27 motherboards, 15 batteries, two clocks, four watches, three hard drives, four audio cards, seven power supplies and 13 floppy disk readers.
Some buildings proved particularly challenging – mainly because of their unique shapes.
In order to work out mathematically-sound locations and sizings for the buildings that make up Midtown Manhattan, the student from Harare used the likes of Wikipedia and Google Maps.
Once he knew the necessary to-scale heights of each building, Menk then hand cut the recycled parts.
To source the materials, he asked around friends, family and those tied to his school.
Menk said: ‘I’ve always thought that the tiny components on PCBs [printed circuit boards] look like small cities, so I think it was some sort of subconscious thing that just clicked in my head.
‘Originally I was planning on doing a local city here in Zimbabwe, but there is simply not enough information available on the buildings.
‘I decided to use Midtown Manhattan because of how iconic it is in terms of skyscrapers.
‘When I first started, I didn’t really have a place to work, so I was using the dining room. This understandably frustrated my family, causing them to build a garden shed for me to work in.
‘They were all very supportive and excited throughout the building process.
‘After the project was completed, the response online was overwhelmingly positive.’
PS And here’s the real thing…
