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Historic Faberge eggs have returned to Russia
On February 4, 2004 Sotheby's announced that the Forbes Collection of Faberge, which had been scheduled to be
sold at auction in New York on April 20th and 21st, had been sold privately to a prominent Russian industrialist,
Mr. Victor Vekselberg, for an undisclosed amount.
The collection consisting of the nine Imperial Easter Eggs and the 180 other jewels was valued earlier by experts at about $90 million.
Among the nine eggs on display, those presented by the jeweller Carl Faberge to the Romanov family every Easter, are the first egg,
a simple white enamel egg with a golden yolk ordered by Alexander III in 1885, and the last egg made, "The Order of St George", which
was smuggled from Russia by Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna in 1919.
The star of the collection is the "Coronation Egg", marking Nicholas II's ascent to the throne.
Only 50 Imperial Easter Eggs are known to have been created by the House of Faberge, and the Collection acquired by Mr.
Vekselberg, now the world's largest private Faberge collection, includes nine Faberge Imperial Easter Eggs.
The collection was first put on display in the Kremlin in May 2004, and then according to plans of Mr. Vekselberg, would travel
to St Petersburg and on to provincial Russian towns.
See All the Nine Imperial Eggs
Location of the Fifty Imperial Eggs
Moscow Kremlin Collection (10)
Mr. Victor Vekselberg's Foundation (9)
Virginia Museum of Fine Arts (5)
Anonymous Private Collections (4)
The Royal Collection, Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II (3)
New Orleans Museum of Art: Matilda Geddings Gray Foundation Loan (3)
Edouard and Maurice Sandoz Foundation, Switzerland (2)
The Hillwood Museum, Washington, D.C. (2)
The Walters Art Museum, Baltimore, Maryland (2)
Prince Rainier III of Monaco Collection (1)
The Cleveland Museum of Art (1)
Unaccounted for (8)
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