Guaco Materia Medica: Ode to Breath, Protection, and Arrival

Guaco was one of the first plants I brought into my studio when I began building a small live-plant collection here in Brazil. At the time, I didn’t know much about it — only that it drew me in.

There were just a few left at the nursery. Something about that alone felt like a quiet signal. I noticed how the vine climbed its simple, almost makeshift trellis — really just a small stick anchored into the soil beside it — and how strong and assured the plant felt as it wrapped itself upward. The leaves were heart-shaped, their edges curling gently, full and alive. It looked healthy. It felt good to be near. That was enough.

In those early days, I wasn’t looking for symbolism or meaning. I was arriving. I was orienting myself. I was setting up a studio in a new country, learning a new rhythm, building something slowly with my hands. The plant became part of the space as the space became part of me.

Later on, I remembered that guaco also grows in Jamaica, where it’s often known as bitter vine. Traditionally, it’s associated with opening the lungs and creating space in the airways — a plant of breath, relief, and expansion. That connection alone felt meaningful, especially in a season of learning how to breathe differently in a new place, both literally and metaphorically.

I didn’t know any of this when I first brought the plant home. I wasn’t seeking protection. I wasn’t performing ritual. And yet, when I look back now, I can see how much that plant quietly held.

It was there through my earliest phases here — the uncertainty of arrival, the slow settling in, the long days of setting up the studio, the first workshops, the first people sitting at my table. It witnessed the in-between moments, the learning curves, the exhaustion and the joy. It occupied the same air as my beginnings.

I no longer have the original plant. End of year holiday travel made that impossible, and letting it go was its own small grief. But as I return to my materia medica illustrations this year, I felt called to make an ode to guaco — not as documentation, but as recognition.

Because sometimes plants do their work quietly. Sometimes protection arrives before we know to ask for it. Sometimes the medicine is simply being accompanied while you build. This illustration is a thank you.

Thanks, plant friend 🌿