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Suffrutex, annual, or shrub, perennial, 1-4 m tall, the branches usually glabres-cent to sometimes densely grayish-pubescent. Leaves long-petiolate, the stipules early or tardily caducous, the blade cordate at the, base, usually deeply 3-lobed and often with 1 or 2 shorter, basal lobes, the lobes deltoid-ovate, with the sinuses often plicate and long-acuminate at the apex, entire-margined, usually 5(-7)-pal-minerved, mostly glabrescent to sometimes densely grayish-pubescent when young. Flowers large, the epicalyx of 3 bractlets, these usually shorter than the corolla, almost as long as broad, cordate at the base, laciniate with few, long, lance-subulate teeth at the apex, persistent; calyx truncate or shallowly 5-denticulate; corolla 3.5-5.5 cm long, pale yellow, turning pink or red; staminal tube about half as long as the corolla, filamentiferous nearly throughout, the filaments all of about the same length. Capsule ovoid, caudate-acuminate, normally 3-locular, usually 3-6 cm long, the surface coarsely pitted, with black, oil glands in the pits; seeds free, with a copious and even coat of lint, with or without a coat of fuzz, sometimes fuzzy at one or both ends.
A shrub which keeps growing from year to year. Often it is grown as an annual. It is 1-3 m high. The stems are purplish. The leaves have 3-5 lobes. The flowers are at the ends of branches. They are yellow but change to reddish purple. They are surrounded by a bract which has 3 toothed lobes. The seeds are small and oval. The seeds have large amounts of lint.
