A mat-forming perennial of the Asteraceae family, native to New Zealand, where it occupies screes, gravel, and open rocky grounds of the montane and subalpine zones of the two main islands, often in sunny exposure and on very well-drained substrates.
It forms an extremely tight and compact carpet, of a grayish-green, made up of tiny oval-lanceolate leaves interlocked on very branched woody creeping stems. This dense and finely textured foliage gives it an almost mineral appearance, in perfect harmony with the rocky substrates it colonizes, allowing it to gradually cover large areas.
The tiny flower heads are sessile and buried in the foliage, white to cream-white with a tawny brown center, dotting the cushion with countless small bright points at the time of flowering. In its natural habitat, its flowering extends from November to January; in cultivation in the northern hemisphere, it generally occurs from May to July.
It requires perfect drainage, poor and mineral soil, and full light exposure. Stagnant winter moisture is particularly unfavorable to it. Cultivation in a trough or very open rock garden, with a bed of gravel in contact with the foliage, remains the most reliable formula under European climates.