How the most expensive Faberge Easter egg came about, and who is its forgotten creator

2023 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-08-25 02:21

The most original among all the eggs created by Faberge for the Imperial House was the "Winter Egg". Nicholas II spared no expense and paid Carl Faberge for it the largest amount ever paid for such products. The author of this world-famous masterpiece was a young woman - Alma Pil, whose name was almost forgotten after the revolution.

1913 was a special year for Russia. In the spring, the jubilee was celebrated - the 300th anniversary of the Romanov dynasty, and Nicholas II wanted to present his mother, Empress Maria Fedorovna, with a special gift for Easter. And such a gift was the "Winter Egg", one of the most spectacular and valuable works of Faberge.

This egg is completely unique. Its shell is carved from a very fragile material - transparent rock crystal. And it is encrusted with small diamonds (about 1300 pieces), the pattern of which imitates a frosty pattern. The base of the egg is also made of rock crystal, and resembles a piece of melting ice, on which "streams" of platinum and diamonds flow down.

The egg is divided into two transparent halves. When they are opened, a surprise is revealed - a basket with a bouquet of white flowers - snowdrops, symbolizing the awakening of nature, the onset of spring.

The basket is made of platinum and decorated with pink diamonds. Snowdrops are carved from white quartz, and their leaves are from jade and green quartz. This egg cost Nicholas II 24,600 rubles.

Of course, everyone has heard about the famous precious Faberge eggs. But the master did not create them with his own hand. On these masterpieces, thereby glorifying the firm and the name of Faberge himself, many magicians-jewelers worked, about whom, unfortunately, very little is known. Who is the author of the famous "Winter Egg"?

Designer Alma Pil

Alma was born in 1888 in Moscow in a family of hereditary jewelers who moved to Russia from Finland. Her father was in charge of the Moscow branch of the Fabergé workshops, and her grandfather, jeweler August-Wilhelm Holmström, owned a workshop in St. Petersburg. So it was destiny to become a jeweler for Alma. After working for some time as a draftsman in the jewelry workshop of her uncle, Albert Holmström, she was hired by the Fabergé firm in 1909. I must say that this was a unique case. Self-taught artist, Alma Peel was the first and only female designer to work for Faberge.

And already at the beginning of the 1910s her finest hour came. The Fabergé firm received an urgent order from the famous oil magnate Emmanuel Nobel, who was the nephew of the equally famous Alfred Nobel. It was necessary to make forty brooches for gifts, elegant and, of course, original. Alma has developed an unusual "frosty" pattern of non-melting snow and ice, a rare pattern that has never been used in jewelry before. They were platinum snowflakes set with shimmering diamonds. Each brooch had its own original design.

Since then, Alma's name has become most closely associated with winter, with ice and snowflakes. In 1912, she used her favorite "frosty" pattern in platinum and diamonds to create an Easter egg for Nobel. As a surprise, a pendant watch was hidden in this “ice” egg.

And, of course, Alma was directly involved in the creation of the "Winter Egg", which became the pinnacle of her work. The motive of its unusual design was suggested by nature itself - a snowball sparkling in the spring sun. Easter was early that year.

Another masterpiece that has become world famous, Alma created in 1914.

The 1917 revolution cut short Alma's brilliant career, and her name was forgotten for many years. In 1921, together with her husband, she emigrated to Finland, where she worked as an art teacher. They remembered the famous designer Alma Pil only after her death, when her albums with wonderful sketches of jewelry were accidentally found.

In the footsteps of the "Winter Egg"

After the revolution, the precious products of the imperial family were confiscated by the Bolsheviks, much of this "" was sold out. Faberge's masterpieces did not escape this fate. In 1927, the "Winter Egg" was taken out of Russia by the English merchant Emmanuel Snowman (it is interesting that his surname matched the purchased masterpiece - it translates as "Bigfoot"). He bought it for £ 500. In 1949, Brian Ledbrook became the owner of the jewelry masterpiece, who died in 1975, and the "Winter Egg" mysteriously disappeared. For many years there was no information about him. But in some happy way, the egg was still found - it turns out that it was stored in one of the safes of the London bank. And it happened in 1994. When the "Winter Egg" was put up for auction at Christie's in the fall of the same year, it was a real sensation. Interested people from all over the world came to Geneva to look at the masterpiece, long considered lost. When the treasure was brought into the hall before the bidding began, all the people in the hall stood up.

The lot, of course, was sold, and sold for a fabulous sum - $ 5, 5 million Qatar Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, who gave $ 9.6 million for him. The egg is still in his collection.