Leaves 6–15 mm wide, glaucous adaxially. Flowers slightly zygomorphic or actinomorphic; tepals withering separately after anthesis, pale to deep blue or bluish violet, each 3-veined, sometimes 5-veined in inner whorls, 15–30 × 3–5 mm; anthers dark bluish violet to brown, 2.5–4 mm; fruiting pedicel incurving-erect, with capsules appressed to raceme axes, 25–70 mm. Capsules 8–16 mm. Seeds 5–10 per locule.

Flowering mid--late spring. Wet meadows; 300--2500 m; Alta., B.C.; Idaho, Mont., Oreg., Wash., Wyo.