Shrubs and small trees, unarmed, epiphytic, without raphides in the tissues, generally succulent. Leaves opposite, petiolate to subsessile, entire, venation not lineolate and often not visible, without domatia; stipules interpetiolar, ligulate to oblanceolate, held erect and flatly appressed in bud, caducous. Inflorescences terminal, sometimes bracteate, cymose and 3-flowered or usually folowers solitary, subsessile to pedunculate, bracts present or reduced. Flowers sessile to pedicellate, bisexual, homostylous, protandrous, diurnal or nocturnal, large, showy, sometimes fragrant; hypanthium cylindrical to ellipsoid; calyx limb reduced or deeply 4--10-lobed, without calycophylls; corolla salverform or funnelform to ventricose, red, green, or white, glabrous, lobes 4--10, triangular, convolute in bud, without appendices ; stamens 4--7, inserted near top or middle of corolla tube; anthers narrowly oblong, dorsifixed near base, included, opening by longitudinal slits, without appendages; ovary 2-locular, ovules numerous in each locule on axile placentas; stigma 1, shortly bilobed, included to partially exserted. Fruit capsular, cylindrical or narrowly oblong, septicidally dehiscent from apex, woody, smooth to longitudinally ridged, valves 2, with calyx limb persistent or tardily deciduous; seeds numerous, flattened, small, fusiform, marginally winged and with a tuft of long filaments at the apex.