Louisa Beresford, Marchioness of Waterford

Louisa Anne Beresford, Marchioness of Waterford (née Stuart; 14 April 1818 – 12 May 1891) was a Pre-Raphaelite watercolourist and philanthropist.

Born in Paris, she was the wife of Henry Beresford, 3rd Marquess of Waterford, younger sister of Charlotte, Countess Canning, daughter of Charles Stuart, 1st Baron Stuart de Rothesay and the former Lady Elizabeth Margaret Yorke.

The family home was at Highcliffe Castle, and had been in Stuart possession since about 1770 when Louisa's great-grandfather, John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute (a founder of Kew Gardens), while out botanising, discovered the cliff-top viewsite overlooking Christchurch Bay, and commissioned the architect Robert Adam, to design High Cliff, a sumptuous Georgian mansion, with grounds laid out by Capability Brown.

His fourth son, Lieutenant-General Sir Charles Stuart, inherited High Cliff, but landslips virtually destroyed the house, and he sold the greater part of the estate. Years later Louisa's father who had had a long and distinguished career, been honoured with a knighthood, and raised to the peerage by George IV in 1828, bought back the land and between 1831 and 1835 built the house that became known as Highcliffe Castle, and which has been described as "the most important remaining example of the Romantic Picturesque style of architecture."

Charles Stuart made use of the architect William Donthorne, a founder member of the Royal Institute of British Architects, to design Highcliffe Castle. Incorporated in the design was carved medieval stonework from the Norman Benedictine Abbey of St Peter at Jumieges and from the Grande Maison des Les Andelys, both of which structures had fallen into disrepair after the French Revolution. Also included in the structure were a 16th-century oriel window and stained glass window.

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