plant stemless, copiously proliferating at the base, flowering to 60 cm high. leaves numerous forming a rosette to 25 cm high, 50 cm diam; sheath distinct, spoon shaped, up to 8 cm long, up to 6.5 cm wide, the bottom third pale light green, the upper part intense violet, blades linear, involute towards the base and narrowing, the upper part flat and recurved, up to 2.5 cm wide, both sides dark purple violet, tip dark green, violet spotted, spreading lepidote dark purple. inflorescence: peduncle erect, slender, glabrous, up to 30 cm long, enclosed by the sheaths of the peduncle bracts, peduncle bracts bottom ones subfoliate, the middle blades shorter dark violet, upper ones similar to the floral bracts distinctly keeled, tapering to a sharp tip, longer than the internodes, appressed to the peduncle; fertile part simple, sword shaped, acuminate complanate, up to 25 cm long, 5 cm wide, more or less 15 flowered; floral bracts distichously suberect, densely imbricated before flowering, at anthesis lax, axis angular brown, and for that reason visible, up to 7 cm long, up to 2 cm wide at the base, top complanate, distinctly keeled, tapering to a sharp tip, smooth, cinnabar red, more or less 1 cm longer than the flowers, sepals yellow, adaxial ones moderately keeled, to 5 cm long, obtuse, free, moderately succulent, much shorter than the floral bracts, petals up to 6 cm long, 9 cm wide, lingulate, yellow with a green recurved tip, at the base 2 entire ligules 7 mm long, stamens long exserted, 6.5 cm long. stamens: filament slender, yellowish and long yellow anthers, the style exceeds the stamens by 0.5 cm, with 3 strongly pappilose green stigmas.Translated by Butcher from: Rauh 1981a. Bromelienstudien (Mitteilung 10). I. Neue und wenig bekannte Arten aus Peru und anderen Ländern .