Martin Motes: Orchid Breeder and Cultivator

Martin Motes has always loved orchids - from his childhood in Florida, using his pocket money to collect orchids to cultivating and breeding new species for orchid lovers everywhere. 

His love of orchids has had him travel to other countries to study South American species of orchids throughout his life. At only age sixteen, he traveled up the Amazon river collecting orchids.

“That was an absolute formative experience that welded me to orchids and to the tropical plants and to the tropics.”

Orchids and humans share something special in common: they’re both bilaterally symmetrical. Martin believes that this is an underlying reason for his fascination with the flower. 

“I think at some deeper level there's an attraction between human beings and these flowers that are somehow formed in a human-like way.”

Martin prides himself on all of the work he has done with the orchid species and is very happy to contribute his work to orchid cultivators after him. 

“Hopefully, before I go to the big greenhouse in the sky, I'm going to see lots and lots and lots more of my orchids bloom.”

Filmed and edited by Jacopo Fantastichini.

Produced by Laura Christian.