Faberge: Lost and Found : The Recently Discovered Jewelry Designs from the St. Petersburg Archives
For readers acquainted only with Faberge's jewel-encrusted eggs, the graceful, dainty pendants, brooches, and diadems shown here reveal the more utilitarian aspects of the famous house's business of catering to aristocratic taste. Delicate hand-colored drawings reproduced from two recently discovered design stock books dating from 1909 to 1915--many accompanied by photos of the finished products, on loan from their owners--form the bulk of the book. By his own admission, however, Snowman ( The Master Jewelers , LJ 10/15/90; Carl Faberge : Goldsmith to the Imperial Court of Russia , LJ 10/15/79) merely repeats and expands upon his September 1987 article in Apollo magazine: Out of the 205 illustrations in the book, more than 40 first appeared in Apollo , as did much of the text. Though this is a beautifully made book, in view of the availability of the Apollo article and the narrow topic, only libraries with strong interest in Faberge or comprehensive decorative art collections need to acquire it.- Therese D. Baker, Western Kentucky Univ. Libs., Bowling GreenCopyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.