This life size white marble statue of Prince Albert Edward, the Prince of Wales (later Edward VII), representing ‘Winter’ was executed by the British sculptor Mary Thornycroft in 1847 for Prince Albert, who had commissioned it for Osborne House and presented it to Queen Victoria as a birthday gift on 24th May 1847.

The statue is part of a group in which four of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert’s oldest children are depicted as allegories of the seasons. Prince Albert Edward is shown standing with a dog sitting by his side, and wearing a tunic, cloak and a hat and holding a shepherd’s crook with his right hand.

Prince Albert, the Prince Consort, commissioned the first statue in 1845 which depicted Princess Alice as an allegory of ‘Spring’ and presented it to Queen Victoria on her birthday on 24th May that year.

The group of the Seasons was completed in 1848 and was exhibited at the 1851 Great Exhibition in London. Queen Victoria liked the statues so much that she commissioned reproductions and reductions in different media.

Mary Thornycroft received her first royal commission in 1842 and during her career she produced numerous busts and statues of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert’s children. It is for her idealised sculptures of children that she became particularly famous.