Customer Reviews

Masterpieces from the House of Fabergé

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When Peter Carl Faberge made the decision to move away from conventional jewelry and focus on the elegant and amusing baubles that were the conversation of their day, he probably never dreamed that his creations would set the standard of objets de luxe for all time. This book is a marvelous compendium of photographs, essays, historical details and commentary by the world's foremost collectors and purveyors of these fantasy creations. Gorgeous photography and rich printing on heavy paper stock make this book a collector's item as well.

Excerpted from the inside flap:
Alexander von Solodkoff, author of this book and an expert on Russian objects, formerly with Christie's, London, has seen many of the treasured Faberge pieces come up for auction. Here he tells the fascinating story of the rise of the House of Faberge and in particular of Carl Faberge, son of the founder, whom the Dowager Empress Marie Feodorovna once called "an incomparable genius."

Christopher Forbes, who has himself written and edited several books on the subject, presided over this one, securing enlightening chapters by Paul Schaffer of A La Vieille Russie in New York and A. Kenneth Snowman of Wartski, London, the eminent dealers whose firms helped to form many of the outstanding Faberge collections of the world. A chapter on the reign of Russia's last czar, Nicholas II, by historian Marilyn Pfeifer Swezey illuminates not only the subject matter of the Fifteenth Anniversary Egg but also the period and world of Faberge.

A complete catalogue (as of publication time) of the growing FORBES Magazine Collection, a chronology, and a list of Faberge workmasters and their marks make this a useful reference book for the collector as well as a glittering presentation of some of the most dazzling examples of the jeweler's art created in the past century.