Erect herb up to c. 15 m. tall; stems tomentose or pubescent and rough with yellow stellate-setose or simple irritant hairs. Leaf-lamina up to 9 × 8 cm., ovate to suborbicular in outline, shallowly to rather deeply 3–5-lobed or 3–5-angled (occasionally not lobed), tomentose to densely pubescent and with stellate, 2–3-branched or simple bristles, apex acute to rounded, margin serrate, base cordate; petiole up to 8 cm. long, hairy like the stems; stipules 3–4 mm. long, filiform. Flowers 5–6 cm. in diam., yellow with maroon or dark red centres, solitary in the axils of the upper leaves and in corymbose terminal or lateral racemes or panicles; peduncle up to 6 cm. long, hairy like the stems, articulated near the apex. Epicalyx of 7–10 bracts; bracts 1 ·5–3·5 mm. long, filiform, usually extending less than halfway to the sinuses formed by the calyx-lobes. Calyx up to c. 16 mm. long; lobes triangular, joined at the base for 7–8 mm. Petals up to 5 × 4 cm., obovate, stellate-pubescent outside where not overlapped, glabrous within. Staminal tube 16 mm. long; free parts of filaments 1–1·5 mm. long. Style-branches 3–4 mm. long. Capsule up to 15 × 9 mm., ellipsoid, setose, with awns up to 3 mm. long. Seeds 2·5 × 2 mm., angular-subreniform, sparsely lepidote.