Plants usually clustering, flowering to 6 dm. Stems short. Leaves 20--50, many-ranked, erect to slightly spreading, gray, 20--50 ´ 0.5--1 cm, coarsely appressed-scaly; sheath dark chestnut brown toward base, triangular, flat, not forming pseudobulb, to 2.5 cm wide; blade narrowly linear-triangular, channeled, leathery, margins involute, apex attenuate. Inflorescences: scape conspicuous, erect, 15--30 cm, 3--6 mm diam.; bracts densely imbricate, erect, like leaves but gradually smaller; sheath of bracts narrowing gradually into blade; spikes erect, 2-pinnate, narrowly elliptic, compressed, 2--7 ´ 1.5 cm, apex acute; lateral branches 2--10. Floral bracts imbricate, erect, uniformly red to rose, broad (covering all or most of rachis, rachis not visible at anthesis), elliptic, keeled apically, 2--2.5 cm, thin, base not visible at anthesis, apex acute, surfaces scaly distally, becoming sparsely scaly toward base. Flowers 10--40, conspicuous; sepals with adaxial pair connate, lanceolate, keeled, 1.7--2.2 cm, thin-leathery, veined, apex acute, surfaces slightly scaly; corolla tubular, petals erect, violet, ligulate, to 4.5 cm; stamens exserted; stigma exserted, conduplicate-spiral. Fruits to 4 cm.

Flowering spring--summer. Epiphytic in swamps and river forests; 0--30 m; Fla.

This species is often confused with Tillandsia bartramii Elliott and T. simulata Small, which share its distribution and narrow leaves. Its probable parentage is T. bartramii Elliott ´ T. fasciculata Swartz.