It depicts Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen, the wife of William IV and Queen Consort of the United Kingdom.

[1] Queen Adelaide is depicted at full-length wearing a red velvet pelisse trimmed with ermine.

[2] Archer Shee was a prominent portraitist of the Regency era and in 1830 had succeeded Thomas Lawrence as the President of the Royal Academy.

However the king was so impressed by the completed painting that he kept it for himself and ordered a second copy to be produced for the Goldsmiths, with Archer Shee being paid £766 for the two versions.

Today the work remains in the Royal Collection at Buckingham Palace, where it hangs on the Grand Staircase alongside an 1827 portrait of her husband by Thomas Lawrence.