Aechmea fasciata

English name: Urn plant/Silver vase plant

Latin name: Aechmea fasciata

Family: Bromeliad - Bromeliaceae

Origin: Brazil

The urn plant, or silver vase plant, is the best-known species of its kind, thus it is a common potted plant. It is marked by slow growth, reaching a height of 30 to 90 cm., and a width of 60 cm. It has elliptic leaves about 45 to 90 cm. in length, centred on a rosette which, characteristic of the ananas (pineapple ) genus, collects water. The plant blooms once during its life, bearing light purple flowers. After flowering so quickly, it loses the shoot together with the leafy rosette, but produces two or three young offshoots.

In the United States, this species appears on the Food and Drug Administration’s data base of poisonous plants, in the section concerning vegetable substances that may irritate the skin.  Contact may lead to dermatitis and to skin allergies.