Brutalism in Costa Rica

Costa Rica's concrete modernism developed in the 1970s and early 1980s, when state institutions commissioned substantial headquarters in San José and local architects adapted brutalist ideas to a tropical climate, using deep overhangs and heavy shading elements. Alberto Linner Díaz was a key figure of this generation, and the towers of the Caja Costarricense de Seguro Social (CCSS) (1981) remain the capital's most prominent brutalist landmark. The Fonseca Colegio Federado de Ingenieros y Arquitectos (CFIA) (1978) shows the professional bodies of the era building in the same confident concrete manner.