A Rare Fabergé Egg Sells for a Record-Breaking £23 Million
The mother of Russia's last emperor, Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna, recently had her Fabergé egg sold for a staggering £23 million at an auction in London. This vintage, jewel-studded egg, known as the Winter egg, was commissioned in 1913 by Emperor Nicholas II as an Easter gift for his mother. It is considered one of the most lavish of Fabergé's imperial creations, crafted by the renowned Russian jeweler Peter Carl Fabergé.
The Winter egg is a masterpiece of craftsmanship, featuring a rock crystal engraved with a frost design on the inside and rose-cut diamond-set platinum snowflake motifs on the outside. Its sale on Tuesday set a new world record for a Fabergé piece, surpassing the previous record of £8.9 million set in 2007 for the Rothschild egg. This is the third time the Winter egg has broken the record for a Fabergé auction, attracting collectors with its rich history and unparalleled significance.
The egg's journey is a fascinating one. After the Russian Revolution in 1917, it was taken from St. Petersburg to the Kremlin armoury in Moscow, along with other royal possessions. In the 1920s, the Soviet government began selling off art treasures from the Hermitage Museum and other collections, and the Winter egg was acquired by Wartski of London. It was later sold to a British collector for £1,500 in 1934. For two decades, between 1975 and 1994, the egg was believed to be missing, before being sold for £6.8 million at Christie's. Eight years later, in 2002, the auction house sold it again for £7.1 million.
Margo Oganesian, Christie's head of department for Fabergé and Russian works of art, expressed her honor in being entrusted with the sale of the exquisite Winter egg for the third time in Christie's history. She emphasized the egg's enduring significance, rarity, and brilliance, both technically and artistically, as one of Fabergé's finest creations. With only a handful of imperial Easter eggs remaining in private hands, this sale presented an exceptional opportunity for collectors to acquire a work of unparalleled importance.
