Plaza de la Democracia

The Museo Nacional de Costa Rica is the national museum of Costa Rica, located in the capital of San José. It is located at Calle 17, between Central and Second Avenue, Cuesta de Moras. It moved to its current location in 1950.

Paseo de los Estudiantes ("Students Walkway" in English) is an urban area in San José, Costa Rica, the capital of Costa Rica. The area began to develop as a commercial center during the last decades of the twentieth century, basically with the advent of supermarkets, shops and some restaurants whose owners are Chinese.

The Museum of Contemporary Art and Design (Museo de Arte y Diseño Contemporáneo), founded in 1994, is a Costa Rican museum, specialising in contemporary Central American art and design, but also representing international work in the field. To comply with this ambitious idea, we define and promote, in a permanent way, the most recent tendencies and dynamics in the world of contemporary art and design.

The Supreme Court of Costa Rica (Spanish: Corte Suprema de Justicia de Costa Rica) is the court of greater hierarchy of Law and Justice in Costa Rica. Established on 25 January 1825, the current President of the Supreme Court of Justice is Fernando Cruz Castro since 1 August 2018. All of the courts in the country are dependent on the Supreme Court of Justice. Its organizational structure is based on three factors: the matter of the subjects to solve, the territory where they take place and the quantity (amount of money that is involved in the subject). The Supreme Court has 22 proprietary magistrates, 25 substitute magistrates in three first chambers and 12 substitute magistrates in the Constitutional Chamber. They are distributed of the following way: five in each one of the three Chambers of Annulment and seven in the Constitutional Chamber. They are nominated by the Legislative Assembly of Costa Rica every eight years.

Atlántico railway station (Spanish: Estación del Ferrocarril al Atlántico) is a railway station and historic building located in San José, Costa Rica, declared as Architectural Patrimony of Costa Rica by decree 11664-C of 29 July 1980. Built in 1908 and open until 1996, it was the main railway station between San José and Limón, where the main freight port is located. The emblematic building combines victorian, neoclassical, and baroque architectures, with some modernist details. In 2011, a restoration effort by the Ministry of Culture and Youth took place to reopen the station as a railway station for the urban train between the cantons of San José, Alajuela, Cartago, and Heredia.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Worship (Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores y Culto) is the ministry in charge of the foreign policy of Costa Rica, including the management of diplomatic missions around the world and their personnel. Its lead title holder is called the Chancellor (Canciller) of the country, a position currently held since January 2020 by Rodolfo Solano Quirós. There is a Vice Minister of Bilateral Affairs and International Cooperation (currently: Adriana Bolaños Argueta) and a Vice Minister for Multilateral Affairs (currently: Christian Guillermet-Fernández)

The Museo del Jade is an archaeological museum in San José, Costa Rica. Since 2014, it has been located in front of Plaza de la Democracia. It was founded in 1977 by Fidel Tristán Castro, the first president of the INS. The museum contains the world's largest collection of American jade.

Carmen is the first distrito of San José Canton in Costa Rica, and one of the four administrative units that form San José downtown (casco central). This district is not heavily populated although it is a busy downtown area in daytime.

The Pre-Columbian Gold Museum (Spanish: Museo del Oro Precolombino, officially Spanish: Museo de Oro Precolombino Álvaro Vargas Echeverría) is a museum in San José, Costa Rica. It is located in a subterranean building underneath the "Plaza de la Cultura" and is owned and curated by the Banco Central de Costa Rica. The museum has an archaeological collection of 3,567 Pre-Columbian artifacts made up of 1,922 ceramic pieces, 1,586 gold objects, 46 stone objects, 4 jade, and 9 glass or bead objects. The gold collection dates from 300 to 400 BC to 1550 AD. The collection includes animal (notably frogs, eagles, jaguars, alligators, deers) figurines, amulets, earrings, erotic statuettes and several dioramas including El Guerrero, a life sized gold warrior figure adorned with gold ornaments in a glass case and a detailed scale model of a Pre-Columbian village. There is also a replica of a pre-Columbian grave containing 88 gold objects which was unearthed on a banana plantation in southeastern Costa Rica in the 1950s. In Costa Rican history, gold was considered a symbol of authority and the items are testament to the craftmanship of the Pre-Columbian period.The Museo Numismático (National Coin Museum) is also located in the same building on the ground level and features displays dating back to 1236, including coins, banknotes and unofficial items such as coffee tokens. The "Casa de Moneda" is also located on the ground level with information on the history of minting in Costa Rica and displays illustrating its development. The collection includes Costa Rica's first coin, the Media Escudo which was minted in 1825.

The 1,140-seat National Theatre of Costa Rica (Spanish: Teatro Nacional de Costa Rica) is Costa Rica's national theatre, located in the central section of San José. Construction began in 1891, and it opened to the public on 21 October 1897 with a performance of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust. The National Theatre stood as a cultural asset of the country during a time when coffee exports were a source of its success. It presents high quality performances, with artistic criteria being very high. The building is considered the finest historic building in the capital, and it is known for its exquisite interior which includes its lavish furnishings.

The Gran Hotel is a hotel in San José, Costa Rica. It was built in 1930 and is a historic monument in the city. Its address is Central and Second Avenue between First and Third Streets. It's located next to the National Theater and the Plaza de la Cultura, under which lies the Pre-Columbian Gold Museum. There is a casino in the lobby and a cafe on the patio, which is noted for its marimba performances.

Parque Nacional Simón Bolívar (Zoológico Simón Bolívar) is an urban park of approximately 14 hectares, located in downtown San José, Costa Rica. It is the oldest botanical garden and zoo in Costa Rica. The name pays homage to Latin American national founder Simón Bolívar. It is administered by a conservation nonprofit foundation called Fundazoo. All animals in the zoo are orphaned, injured or have been disabled and are nursed back to health in hopes of releasing them.Since 2013, activists have been procuring legal means to close this and other zoos in Costa Rica, requesting animals be relocated to cage-free rescue centers.