Jim Irvin has a knack with Cryptanthus, (as well as other bromeliads!), and has produced numerous first-class hybrids.  This is one of which he can be proud.  This hybrid, a cultivar of ‘Sweet Tooth’ x ‘Ice Age,’ and a grex mate to ‘Very Cold Tooth,’ is a dark brown, almost black plant with closely spaced cross banding of silver trichomes with dense silver white scurf underneath.  The inch-wide leaves are long and graceful, undulating at the margins in a symmetrical rosette.

*VIPP plants are Offsets

A hybrid cultivar of Cryptanthus ‘Hapa Haole’ x ‘Elaine’ by Australian, David Cross.  A full rosette of leaves to about 18 inches across.  The leaves are banded with silver over a background color of dark brown to reddish-brown, with slightly wavy margins.

*VIPP plants are Offsets

This is a 2007 cultivar of ‘Durrell’ x ‘San Juan’ by Stephen Hoppin.  The shape is a loose rosette up to 10 inches tall and 24 inches across with shiny green leaves that are wavy with serrated edges.  The leaves have an olive green color that has a hint of bronze along the edge and slight scurfing on the underside of the leaves.

*VIPP plants are Offsets

There aren't many hybrids made with the former Cryptanthus warasii, but this one is a neat hybrid by Nat DeLeon.  The plant has silver leaves that are softer than the warasii with white flowers.

*VIPP plants are Offsets

This is an undescribed species from near Fernando, Bahia, Brazil, collected by Wally Berg and John Anderson, along with Pedro Nahoum in 1997.  It is thought that this may be a red form of Cryptanthus grazielae.  A large grower to about 24 inches with broad, glabrous, coppery colored leaves.  A rather impressive species. 

This plant also has the Marie Selby Botanical Gardens accession number of SEL1997-0355.

A very confusing taxa which has been variously considered Cryptanthus, Orthophytum (supthutii), Lapa and currently; Lapanthus.  A small rosette of thin, semi-stiff leaves with small marginal spines and a nidular inflorescence lacking a scape. 

The bright orange-yellow flowers, borne in a cluster, are long and tubular.  By general appearances it would comfortably fit in any of several genera.  Certainly rare and unusual and a first class collector item.  Needs excellent drainage.  We recommend 'dirty Pearlite', that is Pearlite with a little peat mixed in.