diff --git a/configure.in b/configure.in
index 6f757c23..4d256d65 100644
--- a/configure.in
+++ b/configure.in
@@ -305,6 +305,7 @@ AC_TYPE_SIZE_T
 # Checks for library functions.
 AC_FUNC_MEMCMP
 AC_FUNC_MMAP
+AC_FUNC_MKDIR
 AC_FUNC_VPRINTF
 AC_CHECK_FUNCS([getcwd gettimeofday getwd memset munmap putenv realpath strcasecmp strchr strcspn strdup strerror strrchr strspn vsnprintf realpath mkstemp mktemp random rand sysconf atexit])
 AC_CHECK_LIB(m,cbrt,[AC_DEFINE(HAVE_CBRT,1,[have cbrt() in libm.])])
diff --git a/libvips/foreign/Makefile.am b/libvips/foreign/Makefile.am
index addf7951..7f9e7483 100644
--- a/libvips/foreign/Makefile.am
+++ b/libvips/foreign/Makefile.am
@@ -13,6 +13,7 @@ libforeign_la_SOURCES = \
 	csv.c \
 	csvload.c \
 	csvsave.c \
+	dzsave.c \
 	rawload.c \
 	rawsave.c \
 	vipsload.c \
diff --git a/libvips/foreign/foreign.c b/libvips/foreign/foreign.c
index ea5aead2..f6feaf87 100644
--- a/libvips/foreign/foreign.c
+++ b/libvips/foreign/foreign.c
@@ -1574,6 +1574,7 @@ vips_foreign_operation_init( void )
 	extern GType vips_foreign_save_raw_get_type( void ); 
 	extern GType vips_foreign_save_raw_fd_get_type( void ); 
 	extern GType vips_foreign_load_magick_get_type( void ); 
+	extern GType vips_foreign_save_dz_get_type( void ); 
 
 	vips_foreign_load_rad_get_type(); 
 	vips_foreign_save_rad_get_type(); 
@@ -1587,6 +1588,7 @@ vips_foreign_operation_init( void )
 	vips_foreign_save_raw_fd_get_type(); 
 	vips_foreign_load_vips_get_type(); 
 	vips_foreign_save_vips_get_type(); 
+	vips_foreign_save_dz_get_type(); 
 
 #ifdef HAVE_PNG
 	vips_foreign_load_png_get_type(); 
@@ -2299,3 +2301,45 @@ vips_matload( const char *filename, VipsImage **out, ... )
 	return( result );
 }
 
+/**
+ * vips_dzsave:
+ * @in: image to save 
+ * @dirname: directory to save to 
+ * @...: %NULL-terminated list of optional named arguments
+ *
+ * Optional arguments:
+ *
+ * @suffix: suffix for tile tiles (default ".jpg")
+ * @overlap; set tile overlap
+ * @tile_width; set tile size
+ * @tile_height; set tile size
+ *
+ * Save an image to a deep zoom - style directory tree.
+ *
+ * The image is shrunk in a series of x2 reductions until it fits within a
+ * tile. Each layer is written out to a separate subdirectory of @dirname,
+ * with directory "0" holding the smallest, single tile image.
+ *
+ * Each tile is written as a separate file named as "@x_@y@suffix", where @x
+ * and @y are the tile coordinates, with (0, 0) as the top-left tile.
+ *
+ * You can set @suffix to something like ".jpg[Q=85]" to set the tile write
+ * options. 
+ *
+ * See also: vips_tiffsave().
+ *
+ * Returns: 0 on success, -1 on error.
+ */
+int
+vips_dzsave( VIpsImage *in, const char *dirname, ... )
+{
+	va_list ap;
+	int result;
+
+	va_start( ap, dirname );
+	result = vips_call_split( "dzsave", ap, in, dirname ); 
+	va_end( ap );
+
+	return( result );
+}
+
diff --git a/libvips/foreign/vips2tiff.c b/libvips/foreign/vips2tiff.c
index 059d2bd5..81920ade 100644
--- a/libvips/foreign/vips2tiff.c
+++ b/libvips/foreign/vips2tiff.c
@@ -126,6 +126,8 @@
  * 2/12/11
  * 	- make into a simple function call ready to be wrapped as a new-style
  * 	  VipsForeign class
+ * 21/3/12
+ * 	- bump max layer buffer up
  */
 
 /*
@@ -182,7 +184,7 @@
 /* Max no of tiles we buffer in a layer. Enough to buffer a line of 64x64
  * tiles on a 100k pixel across image.
  */
-#define MAX_LAYER_BUFFER (1000)
+#define MAX_LAYER_BUFFER (10000)
 
 /* Bits we OR together for quadrants in a tile.
  */
diff --git a/libvips/include/vips/util.h b/libvips/include/vips/util.h
index 4d235fd0..ff29ff43 100644
--- a/libvips/include/vips/util.h
+++ b/libvips/include/vips/util.h
@@ -205,6 +205,8 @@ int vips__seek( int fd, gint64 pos );
 int vips__ftruncate( int fd, gint64 pos );
 int vips_existsf( const char *name, ... )
 	__attribute__((format(printf, 1, 2)));
+int vips_mkdirf( const char *name, ... )
+	__attribute__((format(printf, 1, 2)));
 FILE *vips_popenf( const char *fmt, const char *mode, ... )
 	__attribute__((format(printf, 1, 3)));
 
diff --git a/libvips/iofuncs/util.c b/libvips/iofuncs/util.c
index 882530e9..6d83b531 100644
--- a/libvips/iofuncs/util.c
+++ b/libvips/iofuncs/util.c
@@ -1168,6 +1168,47 @@ vips_popenf( const char *fmt, const char *mode, ... )
 	return( fp );
 }
 
+/* Handle broken mkdirs()
+ */
+#if HAVE_MKDIR
+# if MKDIR_TAKES_ONE_ARG
+   /* Mingw32 */
+#  define mkdir(a,b) mkdir(a)
+# endif
+#else
+# ifdef HAVE__MKDIR
+   /* plain Win32 */
+#  include <direct.h>
+#  define mkdir(a,b) _mkdir(a)
+# else
+#  error "Don't know how to create a directory on this system."
+# endif
+#endif
+
+/* Make a directory.
+ */
+int
+vips_mkdirf( const char *name, ... )
+{
+        va_list ap;
+        char buf1[PATH_MAX];
+
+        va_start( ap, name );
+        (void) vips_vsnprintf( buf1, PATH_MAX - 1, name, ap );
+        va_end( ap );
+
+        /* Try that.
+         */
+        if( !mkdir( buf1, 0755 ) ) {
+		vips_error( "mkdirf", 
+			_( "unable to create directory \"%s\", %s" ), 
+			buf1, strerror( errno ) );
+                return( -1 );
+	}
+
+        return( 0 );
+}
+
 /* Break a command-line argument into tokens separated by whitespace. 
  *
  * Strings can't be adjacent, so "hello world" (without quotes) is a single