12 March 2018 / leggypeggy

Fabergé eggs are showstoppers

Easter, eggs, Fabergé, gold, jewellery, museums, palaces, royalty, St Petersburg

Lilies of the Valley Imperial egg (1898), Fabergé Museum

Lilies of the Valley Imperial egg (1898), the surprise at the top are small portraits of the Tsar and the two eldest children

The world owes Viktor Vekselberg a great big thank you! Oh, you’ve never heard of him? Neither had I, but in 2004 this Ukrainian–Russian billionaire businessman had the wisdom, foresight and money to buy a collection of Fabergé Imperial Easter eggs from the Forbes publishing family in New York.

As a result, he is the single largest owner of Fabergé eggs in the world, owning 15 of them (nine Imperial, two Kelch, and four other Fabergé eggs).

Vekselberg paid just over $100 million to buy the nine Imperial eggs. He says he bought them because they are important to Russian history and culture, and he believed them to be the best jewellery art in the world.

Duchess of Marlborough (1902), Fabergé Museum

Duchess of Marlborough (1902), not an Imperial egg

He also bought 180 other Faberge pieces (more about those in another post).

By 2013 and through his Link of Times foundation, Vekselberg had the eggs and other items on public display in the Fabergé Museum, which is housed in the Shuvaloy Palace, one of the most beautiful palaces in St Petersburg, Russia.

Mind you, renovations on the palace took six or seven years.

The Blue Room houses the Fabergé eggs

The Blue Room actually has some blue

So what makes these eggs so special?
Nothing prepared me for the spectacle of just how stunning these eggs are. Vekselberg is right when he describes them as the best jewellery art in the world.

The story of the eggs began in 1885, when Tsar Alexander III decided to give his wife, the Empress Maria Fedorovna, an Easter egg. Peter Carl Fabergé was commissioned to make this first work, known as the Hen Egg (apologies for not getting a pic of this one). It’s an enamelled egg that opens to reveal a golden yolk. This opens to reveal a golden hen that also opens. The last ‘surprise’ is a tiny replica of the imperial crown plus a ruby pendant. These last two pieces have been lost.

Cockerel Imperial egg (1900),

Maria was so captivated by the gift that Alexander appointed Fabergé ‘goldsmith by special appointment to the Imperial Crown’ and commissioned an egg for the next year. After that, it appears Fabergé had complete freedom to design all future Imperial Easter eggs. The only requirements were that each contain a surprise, and that each be unique.

The eggs have their own room—the Blue Room—in the museum, and each egg has its own glass case.

Coronation Imperial egg (1897), the ‘surprise’ is an exact replica of the coronation carriage

Order of St George (1916), Fabergé Museum

Order of St George Imperial egg (1916), the simplest of all the Imperial eggs

Some of the most significant Imperial eggs are the Coronation Egg (1897) made to mark the coronation of Nicholas II and Alexandra Fyodorovna, and Order of St George (1916) made during World War I. A replica carriage was the ‘surprise’ in the coronation egg. The Order of St George egg didn’t contain a surprise (war-time austerity), and was not designed by Fabergé, but followed the family’s instructions. I’ve read conflicting information about this egg. I’ll trust what’s posted in the museum—this is the last Imperial egg ever made and Nicholas II gave it to his mother, Empress Maria Fyodorovna.

Chanticleer Kelch egg (1904) Fabergé Museum

Chanticleer Kelch egg (1904), one of 12 eggs made for Siberian gold mine industrialist, Alexander Ferdinandovich Kelch. These were gifts for his wife, Barbara

One of the most elaborate eggs is Lilies of the Valley (1898). Tsar Nicholas II gave this Art Nouveau egg to his wife, the Empress Alexandra Fyodorovna. Lilies of the valley were her favourite flower. The egg is made of gold, diamonds, rubies, pearls, glass, guilloche enamel, casting, stamping, engraving, gilding and watercolor.

The museum has five or six more rooms filled with other Fabergé treasures, and I’ll cover the in a separate post. The eggs deserve to be showcased alone.

I’ve added a caption (title and date made) to each egg pic (you may have to roll over the pics to see the words).

By the way, 57 of the 65 known Fabergé eggs still exist, and 43 of the 50 Imperial eggs survive.

Renaissance Imperial egg (1894)

Some tips about visiting museums
Arrive early and buy tickets in advance if you can. We got to the Fabergé Museum 20–30 minutes before opening time. We hadn’t bought tickets ahead of time (we weren’t sure we’d be able to go), but I think it is an online option. We were near the front of the queue and we whisked in quickly.

Start in the second room. Poor John has a tactic that works very well. Whenever we enter a museum, we head straight for the second room. Everyone else stops in the first room so it’s packed. If that’s where you start, you’ll jostle along with the ‘herd’ for the rest of the visit. Meanwhile, the second room is deserted.

Fifteenth Anniversary Imperial egg (1911),

Rosebud Imperial egg (1895)

Amazingly, the eggs were in the second room. We were practically the only people there for at least 20 minutes. We then stayed ahead of the crowd and, before leaving, we doubled back to see the treasures in room one. By then room two was packed and it would have been hard to get close to the eggs.

Two questions
Do you have tips for visiting museums, galleries and the like? If yes, please share. And do you have a favourite egg?