British passion for "Fabergé in Lon­don: Rom­ance to Revol­ution" V & A

Imperial Easter eggs created by Carl Fabergé (1846–1920) have been lent by Moscow Kremlin Museums to London’s V&A in the best display of the eggs for years. Fabergé in Lon­don: Rom­ance to Revol­ution will run until May 2022. In the previous post, I discussed the factors that led to Faberge’s success, the impor­t­ance of the Russian Imperial Court and the central role the Imperial Easter eggs played.

But remember the V&A is displaying 200+ of the most st­unning Russian art objects. Now I want to relook at the V&A exhibition, highlighting the small artworks that specifically fulfilled British, Edwardian tastes.

Winter Egg, basket of anemones, 1912–3,
designed by Alma Pihl, for Fabergé.

In Jan 1911 Alfred Nobel’s nephew Emanuel Nobel marked important oc­c­asions in Stockholm where the weather inspired the giving of ic­ic­le art. This Fabergé patron ordered snow flake brooch­es in rock-crystal, with tiny dia­monds. The snow­flakes ev­oked the harsh winter of Russia and soon be­came a popular Fab­erge design, created by Alma Pihl. This Winter Egg was the most expen­sive egg they made.

Czar Alexander III had made Fabergé the Romanovs’ off­ic­ial court jew­eller. His son Czar Nicholas II continued the tradition and by 1900, this Russian-born goldsmith (from Fren­ch Huguenots) made Fabergé into a multi-national enterprise. It spread across several spec­­­ial­ist work­sh­ops, each headed by an expert work mas­ter.

Alexander Palace Egg was presented to Nicholas II by Fabergé, and by Nich­olas to his mother, Dowager Empress Maria Feod­orovna, in Easter 1913. Nich­ol­as’ mother then gave the Easter gift to his wife Al­exandra to celebrate the centenary of the Romanov dynas­ty. The egg’s gold sur­face was adorned with ivory miniatures of all 18 Romanov rul­ers, framed with rose-cut diamonds. Alexandra (1872–1918)’s eggs were display­ed besides a selection of family items in the secl­uded Alexander Palace, their favourite home.

Fabergé’s smalls were usually gifts, circul­ating between spouses, lovers, family and colleagues from the royals and aristocracy. Snowflake brooches and white quartz flowers were ideal; the original­ity of Fab­ergé’s creations meant that they could grow the donor-recipient relation­ship. For the Romanovs, increas­ingly with­drawing into private life in resp­onse to political crises, relat­ionships were very familial. The Empress Maria Feodorov­na had been born Princess Dagmar in King Ch­rist­ian IX of Den­mark’s court and her elder favourite sister, Alexan­d­ra, had married Edward Prince of Wales in 1863. Once Maria discovered Fab­ergé, his small objects made the yearly holiday trips from Russia to Britain.

British Queen Alexandra enticed Fabergé to London, rather than fash­ionable Paris, when he decided to open his first and only branch shop outside Russia in 1903. In an office at Premier House, the new London br­anch did not advertise, and until 1911 it had no shopfront. Only th­ose who had prev­iously been introduced to Fab­ergé knew it was there; they walked upst­airs and knock­ed on a door. Once inside they could purchase everything: hard­stone figures, smoking par­aphern­al­ia, walk­ing stick handles, opera glasses and frames. Fab­er­gé’s ag­ent in London was Henry Bainbridge, whose memoirs of his time with Fab­erge were the source of history about the firm’s UK business.

Jewelled nephrite frog pill, by Fabergé workmaster Michael Perkhin,
St Petersburg, sold 2019 for £225,062. Bonhams

Edward VII and Alexandra became patrons of Faberge London, then the rest of Edwardian England followed. The secl­ud­ed shop became part of the network of social relation­sh­ips. Rus­sian diplomats went to En­g­l­ish country-house parties with Fabergé tr­easur­es. The art of gift-giving was to seal relationships between elite members of society, so the pre­sents had to seem modest. The items act­ually ranged from £5 for simple silver cas­es, to thousands for jewellery.

In 1906 Alex­an­dra designed a bright green neph­rite frog with dia­m­ond eyes, holding a silver-gilt lighter in its mouth, for Edward VII. A monochrome en­amel box decorated with a view of Chats­worth was not for Duke & Duchess of Dev­onsh­ire, but for their friends. Alexand­ra gave the Chat­sworth box to Dowager Duchess Louise Cavendish in 1908.

Until 1917, Fabergé’s objects were used or passed down. Except Queen Alex­and­ra who was found to have many ob­j­ects; nothing was thrown away in 60 years! Vita Sackville-West inher­it­ed many Faberge works from her mother.

See the art nouveau-inspired gold cigarette case fired with layers of blue en­amel over an engraved moiré ground, originally pres­ent­ed to Ed­ward VII by his loved mistress Alice Keppel, another Fabergé devotee. After Edward’s death in 1910, the widowed Queen Alex­andra ret­urned this love token to her ex-rival out of goodwill. Note the glitt­ering snake biting its own tail, a symbol of eternal love evoking the elite world with endless conn­ect­ions. This clearly resonated with the British royal family

Cigarette case, by Fabergé, 1908. 

Royal Collection Trust

Silver cigar cutter carp, by Henrik Wigstrom for Fabergé,

c1908, St Petersburg
Realised £47,800.

Fabergé workshops were able to convert functional items into art obj­ects sculpted as silver animals. Examine chief work-master Henrik Wigs­tröm’s silver cigar-cutter shaped as a carp. The cabochon pink eyes set in gold formed the push-pieces and the mouth as the cutter.

Post-Revolution Western markets welcomed Fabergé items that came out of Bol­shevik Russia via smugglers & exiles. Or via the Antik­variat, Len­in’s Ministry of Trade dep­artment specif­ically designed for the profit­able disposal of art. Eg in 1933 King George V found the Mosaic Egg, which Pihl designed for Alexandra. Con­fiscated by the prov­is­ional gov­ernment in 1917, the Antik­variat sold it for 5,000 roubles.

Fabergé in London: Romance to Revolution showed Russian crafts­manship closely connected to the glamour of the Russian Imperial family, Brit­ish aristocrats, American heir­esses, ex-Grand Dukes, Mah­ar­ajas and rich finan­c­iers, via the Lon­don branch. Read Kieran McCarthy, Fabergé in Lon­don: British Branch of the Imperial Russian Goldsmith (2017). 

Kieran McCarthy's book