Drained lake basins dominate large parts of lowland Arctic Alaska, where thaw of ice-rich permafrost is changing surface hydrology patterns and leading to both thermokarst lake formation and lake drainage. The Baldwin Peninsula in western Alaska has abundant ther-mokarst lakes and drained lake basins, with drained lake area generally dominating over lake area. These lake and drained lake basin systems are highly dynamic, and often create a mosaic of shallow topographic depressions with increased surface water retention and wetland formation. In fact, many basins develop into peat-forming wetlands following lake drainage. In addition, ice-wedge polygon networks frequently develop in these drained lakes. In Arctic lowlands with ice-rich permafrost, cryoturbation, thermokarst-induced sediment disturbances and mass wasting processes in general can make sedi-ment-based palaeoreconstructions challenging. Therefore, the often relatively undis-turbed peat sequences from the centres of ice-wedge polygons can be highly valuable palaeo-archives, particularly for Holocene time scales. Similarly, the centres of drained lake basins have less disturbed sediment than their marginal parts. We targeted peat from drained lake basins as archives to infer past environmental and landscape dynamics as well as vegetation composition and organic matter storage and decomposition in this highly dynamic region of the Arctic. During field work in April 2024, sediment cores were obtained from the upper 2-2.5 m of frozen ground in the centres of fifteen drained lake basins. Coring site selection in the field targeted the centres of ice-wedge polygons, which have been shown to have the least dis-turbed sedimentation and peat growth within ice-wedge terrain. Here we present the first results of sediment and organic matter composition. For the first eight cores, sediment core logs, elemental contents and composition of carbon, nitrogen and mercury as well as grain size distribution provide an insight into the palaeoenvironment before and after lake drainage. In at least two of the basins, there is initial evidence that the cores capture an entire life cycle of a thermokarst lake from lake inception to drainage followed by wet-land initiation. These palaeoarchives provide a unique view into one of the most common and dynamic landforms of permafrost lowlands relevant for past, current, and future car-bon cycling and sequestration.