Gardenia remyi, a member of the Rubiaceae (coffee) family, is a tree 3 to 13 m (10 to 43 ft) tall with branches that are quadrangular, puberulent (covered in soft, downy hairs) and viscid (sticky or slimy). Leaves are few, clustered towards the tips of the branches, elliptic to broadly elliptic or obovate, 9 to 24 cm (3.5 to 9.5 in) long, 5 to 10 cm (2 to 4 in) wide, with the upper surface glabrous and the lower surface dull. Flowers are fragrant, solitary, and terminal, with a narrowly funnelform hypanthium (the bowl-shaped part of a flower on which the sepals, petals, and stamens are borne) and a white corolla that is six to eight-lobed. Fruits are orange, subglobose to broadly ellipsoid, and 1 to 2.8 cm (0.4 to 1.0 in) in diameter. Seeds are irregularly obovate, 1.8 to 2.1 mm (0.07 to 0.08 in) long.