plant with a large, erect stem of 20–40 cm long, covered by leaf sheaths, propagating usually by a single, elongate, erect pup produced around the inflorescence or at the base of the rosette; stem erect or decumbent, 1–1.2 cm diameter, completely covered by dead and live leaves that when dried become curved downwards. leaves 30 to 40 or more jp cultivated specimens, spreading-recurved, equally and subdensely distributed along the stem; sheath suborbiculate, 1.5 cm long, 0.8–1 cm wide, submembranaceous, adaxially glabrous on base and margins, abaxially densely white-lepidote, dark red, and strongly rugose, coarsely spinose toward the apex; blade very narrowly triangular-lanceolate, not contracted at base, apex long acuminate-caudate, (5.5-)8–10(–14) cm long, 8–12 mm wide at the base, subcoriaceus, channeled, green, completely covered beneath by white scales, margins straight, not undulate, subdensely serrate with subspreading reddish spines 1–2.5 mm long, 2–3 mm apart. inflorescence rather few-flowered, 2–3 cm long, with about 10 fascicles; primary bracts foliaceous; floral bracts triangulate-ovate, acuminate, nearly equaling the sepals, entire or the upper ones remotely spinulose, membranaceous, sparsely floccose-tomentolose outside. flowers all hermaphrodite, about 3 cm long, fragrant; sepals oblong-lanceolate, subsymmetric, 8–15 mm long, connate at the base for 3–4 mm, free lobes with apex broadly acute and apiculate, 4–5 mm long, about 3 mm wide, all slightly carinate, entire; petals widely ovate, obtuse, about 22 mm long, 8–9 mm wide, connate for 2–3 mm in a very narrow common tube with the filaments and the style, slightly exceeding the stamens but nearly spreading and exposing them. stamens: anther sublinear, about 3.5 cm long, fixed at 1/3 of its length about the base, base sagittate, apex apiculate. pistil: ovary subellipsoid, trigonous in cross section, 5–6 mm long, 3–4 mm diameter, sparsely floccose-tomentolose; epigynous tube absent; ovules 20 to 30 in each locule, obtuse. fruits green; seeds subovate, 1.5 mm long, yellowish brown when fresh, notably sulcate-rugulose.Edited from : Ramirez 1996. Systematics, phylogeny and chromosome number evolution in Cryptanthus (Bromeliaceae) .