plant stemless, flowering scarcely more than 25 cm high. leaves many, suberect, then recurving, 35 cm long, more or less red-striate toward base, finely appressed-lepidote; sheath elliptic, distinct, 6 cm long; blade linear-triangular, attenuate, 10–15 mm wide. inflorescence: peduncle erect or inclined, very short and almost completely hidden by the leaves; pedunclebracts densely imbricate, the lower foliaceous, the upper elliptic, acute; fertile part simple with several sterile bracts at base, elliptic, obtuse or broadly acute, strongly complanate, to 16 cm long and 7 cm wide, very dense, to 20-flowered; floral bracts elliptic, acute, sharply carinate, exceeding the sepals, coriaceous, even, rose or red, drying to stramineous, obscurely pale-lepidote. flowers: sepals free, elliptic, obtuse or broadly acute, 35 mm long, the adaxial carinate; petal-blades spreading, broadly subrhombic, apiculate, deep violet, 20–25 mm long. stamens deeply included, exceeding the style.Edited from : Smith & Downs 1977. Tillandsioideae (Bromeliaceae). in Flora Neotropica.