And what is the island bed supposed to accomplish? If you want help here, you should post the space in photos.

Pines don't look too tropical, but depending on your planting zone (which you might consider putting into your profile), they could be paired with tropicals. For instance, we have pine groves on our property with at least 3 different kinds of pines. Growing next to the pines are queen and Mexican palms (tropical look). Ficus Carica have nice large leaves and can look tropical. I guess you need to figure out heights and width of plants in 20 years. Hibiscus and Plumaria would add color. If you are in a tropical zone, it shouldn't be hard to achieve the tropical look, but if you get freeze hours, mimicking tropics would really be tough.

We had a neighbor here in So CA that was enamored with Hugh Hefner, so he went to great extremes to create a jungle. Drove by his house 20 years later, and it does look like a jungle! He had tiki carvings, etc. He found an artist who used the fallen bark from palms to create animals.

The cost would all be up to you. Research is free. Any person can throw paint at a canvas and call it art, but not everyone sees it as "art". A real designer considers many factors so to achieve the look you envision, that won't be free. Some nurseries offer design services for free, but you must purchase plants from them. Plants are pretty cheap in 1 gallon pots, but the price goes up the bigger the pot. Don't forget all the care and nutrients needed to maintain your tropical area. Plan for paths to wander through and prune and weed.

I'm trying to send pics from my phone but got reply "This is an automatically generated Delivery Status Notification.
Delivery to the following recipients failed.

noreply@houzz.com

Can you send the photos to your email and save them to your desktop or laptop? Easy once they are on a hard drive. Just click the photo link below your post, browse, and it's an easy thing.

It is 7b/8a NE Atlanta and gets sun till 11:30 and then a couple hours of dappled shade. It faces S/SE. It belongs to my single son who isn't a gardener so this is my project and I live 150 miles away.This will need well behaved material.

I'm looking to create a feeling of tropics that fit with the Asian design and also that fits in the neighborhood. Not so much a jungle-I've seen where pines and palms mingle as elevation changes toward a coast.

There will be a rock "water fall" that will faces the front door. I've planted a needle palm have cast iron plants from my garden and hellebore to go under the pines. Holly, autumn and Jap painted ferns, big leaf blue and yellow type hostas, carex and coral bells will go there and down the falls area. To the left in front of the first pine is also a needle palm and than another in the middle of the open area. I've got a fatsia to go next to the pine and thinking elephant ears and cannas below the pine/palm, next to the 'pooling' of the falls. I think they will be easier to water together in that area.

I plan to put a windmill palm in the corner of the deck and stairs.

It's the open area that has me stumped. It needs to be low enough so as not to swallow the house. The needle palm and the sago thats planted to the front corner should be the tallest. The only other things that are a definite are some purple wandering jews. I picked up a couple of the newer endless summer and a gold dust acuba but thinking they should go more in the woods.

The problem is I've succumbed to Lowes discount racks of 'last wilt and testament' plants that appear daily. I've been able to cruse a half dozen going back and forth from home every week. This was suppose to be a simple pull up a bunch of ivy and stick a few plants in but nooooo...... just couln't pass up 50 to 75% off and that got my gardening mojo going and I created a monster of a job that needs to get stuff in the ground now that it's in the 90s and little rain.

i'm adding a few more pics as my first attempts from my phone didn't work do to too large of files.

Insiration shot.

I'll also mention that I think the area is heavy clay seems to be dry .

Given that you are surrounded by English ivy I hope you don't look at it as the ever looming enemy. It can be managed and is extremely useful.

There's just so much of it and it's swallowing everything down the side yard and in the back. It's at least 6-12" deep on the lower back of the island. It would be nice if it could be reduced and maintained.

At the front yard, isn't there "so much" grass, too? But it's being managed and no one is distressed by it. I'm guessing that there's a lot of ivy in the neighbor's yards. It's better to learn to manage it than to think you'll somehow overcome the ocean of it that surrounds you. The ivy doesn't "swallow everything" unless no one ever edges it or clips where it's growing vertical but is unwanted, or just gives it the herbicide treatment where it's really not wanted. It wouldn't be long before you'd learn how much and how often. In the third and fourth picture from the top, I see where it meets the turf and it looks very orderly. It appears that some of it is being successfully managed by the lawn mower. I managed A LOT of ivy during my years in Atlanta and found it not only to be quite easy, but a godsend for covering ground in all the shady areas. I had not trouble keeping it off of the trees where I didn't want it. As a groundcover it grows a uniform 8" unless it's growing on something.