A succulent biennial to perennial plant with a cluster of very short 1-3-cm tall rosettes reaching a height of 20 cm when flowering in cultivation, but mostly less. Short branches arise from the axils of the leaves and from the base of the plant. Leaves 4-ranked, ovate, tightly adpressed initially but opening up upwards with onset of flowering, glabrous, with a row of hydathodes along the leaf margin and on the upper surface, margins with globular cilia. Inflorescence a thyrse with 5 or 6 sessile flowers in leaf axils along the stem and branches. Flowers shortly tubular, 2.5-3 mm long. Calyx extending up to half the length of the flower, joined at the base, lobes lanceolate, acute, glabrous, cilia absent. Petals white, pale green basally, erect, oblong, opening out in upper half at maturity but fused basally, each with a casque-like terminal appendage and incurved apex. Squamae oblong, entire, cuneate, orange-brown. Carpels pyriform, style absent, stigma large, dorsolateral.
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