Corymbosely much branched, upright, up to 1 m tall perennial shrublet with striate, floccose to glabrescent, pale brown stems with thread-like petiolar remains at the base. Leaves leathery, flat, discolorous, glabrescent green above, white tomentose and prominently veined beneath; basal leaves shortly coarsely petiolate, up to ca 30 cm long, 5 – 8 cm wide, irregularly  sinuately spinose-lobed, spines stiff, 5 – 10 mm long, basally cobwebby woolly; cauline leaves ovate, cordate, shortly adnate-decurrent, broadly ± sinuate lobed and spinescent; uppermost leaves much reduced, below synflorescence. Capitula subsessile or short-peduncled, 15 – 20 in each dense glomerule of capitula. Involucre cylindrical, ca 20 mm long, 5 – 7 mm wide, basally attenuate, slightly enlarged upwards, glabrescent. Phyllaries pale-green, rigid, erect, 14 – 18, lanceolate-subulate, all ± equal, minutely spinulose-serrulate on margins, dorsally carinate, ± overtopping florets or not; outermost very small. Receptacular bristles smooth. Florets usually 5 per capitulum. Corolla yellow, ca 12 mm long, tube ca 2 mm long, limb almost 5 times longer than the tube, with ca 3 mm long lobes. Anther tube pale-pink, glabrous. Cypselas 3 – 4-angled, 5 – 6 mm long, 2 – 2.5 mm wide, scrobiculate, broadly lobulate on margins, apically truncate, without pappus.