This photograph was almost certainly taken at the same time as ‘Rehearsal for the Scottish National Pageant at Saughton Park, Edinburgh’, also held in the collection of the Scottish National Portrait Gallery. Both photographs feature the painter E.A. Walton but here we also see Walter Crane, his wife and Cecile Walton. The figures featured in both these photographs worked closely together as artists, designers and patrons. At this time, contemporary dress was stiff and formal. This may help to explain the group’s enthusiasm for fancy dress and amateur acting – it offered a way of escaping the present into a world of lavish fantasy.