Vitu-Ghazi, the City-Tree

Vitu-Ghazi, the City-Tree first appeared in the 2005 Ravnica: City of Guilds set, representing the massive, sentient tree that serves as the headquarters for the Selesnya Conclave. It was designed as a utility land that captured the flavor of the guild’s communal expansion, allowing players to generate creature tokens to populate their board presence. This version, featured in the 2016 Planechase Anthology, serves as a planar card, shifting its function from a static land to a global environmental effect that players travel to during the unique multi-player format of Planechase.

The card’s visual identity was originally conceptualized by artist Martina Pilcerova, who focused on the sheer scale of the arbor-city, blending architectural stone structures with organic, sprawling roots. The artwork emphasizes the intersection of nature and civilization, a central theme of the Selesnya guild’s philosophy. The Planechase Anthology reprint retains this iconic imagery, framing it within the chaotic, shifting reality of the Multiverse as defined by the Wizards of the Coast design team, who sought to translate stationary locations into dynamic, game-altering planes.