These are herbaceous anemones that are much larger than the spring-flowering bulbs Anemone blanda and nemorosa, typically 50 to 80 cm high, some a little taller, some more spreading. All have lovely flowers, white, pale yellow, blue, red, often with a darker flush to the outside of the petals (strictly sepals). They include plants from woods and from alpine meadows, and originate all round the northern hemisphere.

Anemone parviflora is a neat, compact plant, with large, white flowers with a yellow boss of stamens, each flower in a separate erect stem. The outsides of the sepals (and therefore the buds) have a bluish tinge. It comes from sub-arctic parts of north America.