It occurs at elevations of 1000 – 1500 m in moist to wet forests, and even in swampy grassland, across Sub-Saharan Africa; it is recorded from Guinea, Nigeria, Cameroon, the Sudan, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Mozambique, South Africa, Eswatini, and Angola.

[3] With older stems becoming woody, it grows from a tuberous rootstock which has a ginger or liquorice taste and an aroma reminiscent of vanilla.

The flowers are unusually large for the subfamily Periplocoideae, and have a malodorous fruity scent which grows as the day progresses.

The paired large fruits or follicles (75–100 x 44 mm) are semi-woody with a velvety surface.

The species epithet commemorates A.S. White, a South African farmer, who sent specimens to Kew to John Croumbie Brown, Colonial Botanist at the Cape, who sent them on to Joseph Dalton Hooker, who described the species.