Princess Louise (1848–1939) was the sixth of Queen Victoria's nine children. Beautiful and artistic, she supported the women's movement and helped launch the Girls Public Day School Company.

Queen Victoria noted in her Journal that Graves, a fashionable aristocratic portraitist, 'lately painted a very pretty picture of Louise' but she criticised the drawing of the throat. Graves had already had one painting for Queen Victoria rejected and a contemporary observed in a letter the difficulties the painter was facing: 'He says it dont pay painting The Queen - & he would rather not. The honor is great but the payment ordinary and the expence of living down here [Osborne] considerable. Beside which he is driven wild with Royal suggestions'.

The Princess is wearing a cream day dress with a ide collar strung with ropes of pearls, and a gardenia corsage at her bossom.

Inscribed on the back with the names of the artist and sitter and the date, 1871.