Large or medium woody climbers, often shrub-like when young but then with scandent or arching stems. Leaves opposite; usually with an interpetiolar ridge bearing colleters; blade with a very conspicuous intramarginal vein. Inflorescence terminal, sometimes also axillary, cymose, often forming a panicle; flowers 5-merous. Sepals narrowly ovate to linear, quite large and showy; colleters in a continuous row inside. Corolla lobes dextrorse in bud; mature corolla with spreading or erect lobes. Stamens inserted in lower half of corolla tube, completely included in tube; filaments short; anthers fertile in the upper half only, the lower half sterile, laterally with lignified guide rails and sagittate appendages at the base; adnate to the style head. Disk a 5-lobed ring. Gynoecium 2-carpellate, apocarpous but apically united into a common style; ovules numerous; ovaries minutely puberulent to glabrous; style consisting of a narrower basal part and a conical upper part to which the stamens are attached near the top. Fruit of paired follicles; linear. Seeds flattened; with an apical coma.
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