Constellation (Fabergé egg)


The Constellation egg is an unfinished 1917 Easter egg designed under the supervision of Peter Carl Fabergé for the last Tsar of Russia, Nicholas II, as an Easter gift to his wife, the Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna. It was the last "Imperial" Fabergé egg designed.
The egg was due to be completed and delivered to the Tsar on Easter 1917. Before the egg was delivered however, the February Revolution took place and Nicholas II was forced to abdicate on 15 March.

History, description and authenticity

According to Franz Birbaum, Fabergé’ workshop manager, the egg was conceived as a clock in the form of a celestial globe of dark blue glass encircled by a rotating dial, held above billowing rock crystal clouds surmounted by silver cherubs; the whole supported on a nephrite pedestal. The globe was to be decorated with a diamond studded engraving of the constellations under which Tsarevitch Alexei was born. Work began on the egg, but the 1917 February Revolution and subsequent events overtook its production.
Birbaum tells in a letter written in August 1922 to Fabergé's eldest son, Eugene, the following:
Likewise, Birbaum says in his memoirs in 1919:
In 1925 the egg’s last owner, Fabergé's second son Agathon [Carl Theodor Fabergé|Agathon], delivered several dozen Fabergé pieces to the academician Alexander Fersman. Among these was an unfinished piece, comprising two halves of a dark-blue egg of cobalt glass and an unfinished base of rock crystal, made to resemble clouds. The clock dial and cupids, mentioned by Birbaum, were never found.
In 2001, the unfinished egg was identified in the collection of the Fersman [Mineralogical Museum] in Moscow. Experts believe it to be the unfinished 1917 egg by Fabergé. It lacks the diamonds, nephrite base and silver putti intended to decorate it. Its authenticity is supported by numerous studies by Russian experts.
Tatiana Muntian, Fabergé expert at the Kremlin Armoury, confirmed the discovery by comparing the three found pieces to the original sketch signed by Karl Fabergé in 1917, as well as:

A false pretender

The Russian art collector Alexander Ivanov, claims that he owns the original egg. In 2003–2004 he said that he acquired this egg in the late 1990s and affirmed that "the Fersman Museum erroneously continues to claim that it has the original egg." Fabergé experts do not agree and describe his egg as a Fauxbergé. Ivanov's egg is in the so-called Fabergé Museum in Baden-Baden, which houses his Fabergé/Fauxbergé collection.