grand duke of Hesse-Darmstadt from 1892 until his abdication in 1918, at the end of World War I. His father was the grand duke Louis IV, whom he succeeded on March 13, 1892, and his mother was Princess Alice, daughter of Queen Victoria of England and the prince consort, Albert.

Ernest Louis was best known as a patron of the arts. In 1899 he founded the Darmstadt Artists' Colony for architects, designers, sculptors, and craftsmen. Most of the colony's buildings were designed by the Viennese architect Joseph Maria Olbrich (Olbrich, Joseph). Much of the work done under the patronage of Ernest Louis was representative of the Jugendstil movement, the German version of Art Nouveau. Ernest Louis himself wrote poems, plays, essays, and piano music.