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The painting represents a beautiful young woman, adorned only with a pearl-studded bonnet and an exquisite pearl and gold pendant necklace, admiring herself in a mirror. All the attributes of the figure are typical of Venus at her toilette. The antique urn, the helmet of Mars, and Cupid's bow and arrows with quiver at the stone platform place this representation in the realm of classical mythology. However, since the seventeenth century, the standing figure was identified as Vanitas.
The sculptural aspects of Gossart's figure connect the painting with northern Italian sculpture types, such as Riccio's Venus.
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