Costa Rica
Turrialba
Diego Robelo
Aquiares Estate
Blend Caribe (Centroamericano, Esperanza and Mariana)
Washed
2023 - 2024
Hint of rose hip, Light rooibos tea, Mild tea-like body
1200 meters
Carbon Neutral Farm, Rainforest Alliance
69 Kg W/Grainpro
SOLD OUT
Aquiares Estate, whose name means “land between rivers” in the Huetar indigenous language, is located on the slopes of the Turrialba volcano in Costa Rica. Established in 1890, it is the largest coffee farm in the country and home to a community of approximately 1,800 people.
The farm’s modern development is closely linked to Alfonso Robelo, who arrived in Costa Rica in the 1980s and led the transformation of Aquiares into a more stable and integrated community. By enabling farm workers to purchase their homes, Aquiares evolved from a traditional estate model into a small town structure, strengthening long-term engagement in coffee production. Today, the farm is managed by his son, Diego Robelo, who continues to expand its focus on specialty coffee through agronomic improvements, variety selection, and processing innovation.
Aquiares operates with a strong emphasis on sustainability, including carbon neutrality initiatives and the preservation of biological corridors that support local biodiversity. The farm also collaborates with research institutions on environmental and agricultural studies, reinforcing its role as a model for sustainable coffee production in Central America.
his coffee is a blend of three F1 hybrid varieties:
Together, these hybrids bring unique characteristics to the cup.
Turrialba’s climate is well suited to growing this new variety, and Aquaires is up to the challenge of meeting its complex nutritional needs. This hybrid represents the best of the farm and cupping worlds because it is high-yielding and rust-resistant, and has a complex, elegant profile.
This lot underwent mechanical washing and a 6-hour drying period to initiate partial fermentation. It was then dried for 32 hours in a Guardiola dryer at temperatures ranging from 45°C to 55°C.
The region of Turrialba is Costa Rica’s hidden coffee gem. The city of Turrialba is a modest agricultural town in the Province of Cartago, and the coffee farms spread throughout the Canton of Turrialba, from smallholder plots to the country’s largest estates, produce coffees with a range of cup profiles and interesting genetic legacies.
Turrialba is home to CATIE, the Center for Tropical Agricultural Research and Education, one of Central America’s premier crop research and development sites as well as one of Latin America’s largest living coffee tree variety collections. Along with other research institutions, CATIE helped produce many of the hybrid and selected coffee varieties now common in Costa Rica and neighboring countries.
The Turrialba Volcano is still active today—it began erupting more consistently starting in 2014—and the region’s volcanic soil is rich with nutrients. The area’s farmers grow vegetables and sugarcane as well as coffee, and landowners in the lower area raise beef cattle. Turrialba’s productive land supplies much of Costa Rica’s domestic needs and coffee prepared for export passes through the area’s private mills, which are more common here than the cooperatives organized in other cantons.
