This is one of Cadell's largest paintings. The style is influenced by the broad brushstrokes of the Impressionists. The use of the mirror was a common artistic device, enabling an artist to show both the front and back views of a model in a single picture. Until the creation of the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art in 1959, the National Galleries of Scotland would not purchase work by living artists or even those who had been dead for less than ten years. This painting was bought immediately after Cadell's ten-year period in 'purgatory' had elapsed.