Rather compactly branched shrub up to 5 m. tall with slender spreading branchlets; bark brown. Branchlets, lvs and peduncles clad in white hairs when young, becoming glab. Lvs on petioles ± 5-6 mm. long, lamina coriac., 5-7·5 × 2-3·5 cm., obovate-cuneate to elliptic-oblong, obtuse to subacute, abruptly narrowed to apex, gradually narrowed to petiole; margins thickened. Fls terminal, solitary or in 2-4-fld umbels; pedicels slender, c. 1·5 cm. long, with scattered hairs. Sepals subulate to narrow-oblong, acute, pilose; petals oblong, obtuse, 1-1·5 cm. long, dark red. Capsules depressed-subglobose, c. 2-2.5 cm. diam., 3-4-valved, glab. when mature; valves hard, woody, furrowed or not.

2n = 24