Native FloraApril 28, 2026
Costa Rica possesses extraordinary native flora, yet many tropical spaces continue relying on imported ornamental species disconnected from local ecosystems.
Costa Rica possesses some of the most extraordinary tropical biodiversity on the planet. Yet many of our urban spaces, gardens and architectural projects continue feeling disconnected from that reality.
In many cases, tropical landscaping has become repetitive. The same ornamental species are used over and over again, often copied from trends developed in other regions of the world without fully understanding the biological conditions of the site or the ecological potential of native flora.
What is interesting is that many Costa Rican native plants, often ignored locally, are actually highly valued internationally.
Species such as Hymenocallis littoralis, Chrysothemis pulchella, Calathea micans, Acmella repens or Salvia polystachya possess extraordinary ornamental, architectural and ecological value while also adapting naturally to tropical environments with very little maintenance.
Entire groups of native plants, particularly many Zingiberales, Gesneriaceae, Bromeliads and Araceae, remain largely underexplored within contemporary tropical landscaping.
Part of the problem comes from the way tropical design is often approached.
Instead of studying the specific environmental conditions of each site, many projects simply repeat existing formulas. Designers become overwhelmed by the enormous diversity of tropical plants and end up relying on the same familiar species or imported trends.
Ironically, some of the most innovative tropical architecture firms are precisely the ones that have understood the importance of working directly with biodiversity, climate and ecological identity as part of the design process itself.
Native plants do not necessarily differ dramatically from exotic tropical species in terms of humidity, rainfall or general physiological behavior. Many tropical plants from Asia, Africa or South America can adapt successfully to Costa Rica.
What cannot be replicated are the ecological relationships that native species maintain with the rest of local biodiversity.
These interactions are the result of millions of years of evolution.
Soil microorganisms, fungi, mycorrhizae, bacteria, pollinators, insects, amphibians, birds and mammals all participate in complex biological networks that continue functioning even within human spaces.
Some species depend entirely on these relationships to survive.
Tree ferns, for example, often require very specific mycorrhizal associations during early stages of development. Certain pollinators evolved alongside highly specialized flowers found only within particular ecosystems. Mammals such as tapirs continue acting as seed dispersers for many tropical species.
This ecological complexity is impossible to reproduce artificially.
Another aspect of tropical landscapes that deeply interests me is their constant transformation through time.
The tropical premontane wet forest that once dominated much of Costa Rica’s Central Valley has almost completely disappeared due to urbanization and the historical expansion of coffee cultivation.
Yet many native species still carry the memory of those ecosystems within their biological behavior.
During the dry season, many herbaceous species disappear completely from the visible landscape. Some survive through underground rhizomes, others reduce their structures and conserve humidity internally until rain returns again.
Species such as Achimenes longiflora or Begonia plebeja demonstrate how tropical landscapes are not static compositions, but constantly evolving living systems responding to climate, light and seasonality.
Personally, one of the most frustrating things is seeing Costa Rican tropical spaces designed with species that could exist almost anywhere else in the world.
Meanwhile, many native plants from Costa Rica are treated as botanical treasures internationally while remaining largely ignored locally.
Part of this disconnect may also come from history itself.
Costa Rican researcher Guillermo Chaves once described how much of our perception of “monte” or wild vegetation could be understood as a colonial inheritance. When colonists arrived, forests represented danger, disease and obstacles for agriculture and settlement. Large portions of the original tropical landscape were removed and replaced.
In many ways, we are still carrying part of that perception today.
Perhaps one of the great challenges moving forward is learning to reconnect with the tropical garden we already possess.
Not by copying European landscapes or international trends, but by understanding the extraordinary ecological and aesthetic value of our own biodiversity.
Maybe it is time to begin imagining something different:
A true Costa Rican wild garden.
A landscape language built from native ecosystems, biological relationships and tropical identity itself.
