page_title: House of Fabergé
section_title: Hardstone sculptures
hierarchical_section_title: House of Fabergé / Rise to prominence / Hardstone sculptures
caption_attribution_description: English: Purple amethyst cane handle by Fabergé with white enamel, rose and yellow gold, and a string of pearls. Circa 1890-1898
context_page_description: The House of Fabergé is a jewellery firm founded in 1842 in Saint Petersburg, Russia, by Gustav Faberge, using the accented name Fabergé. Gustav's sons, Peter Carl and Agathon, and grandsons followed him in running the business until it was nationalised by the Bolsheviks in 1918. The firm was famous for designing elaborate jewel-encrusted Fabergé eggs for the Russian Tsars, and for a range of other work of high quality and intricate detail. In 1924, Peter Carl's sons Alexander and Eugène Fabergé opened Fabergé & Cie in Paris, making similar jewellery items and adding the name of the city to their rival firm's trademark, styling it FABERGÉ, PARIS.
  In 1937, the rights to the Fabergé brand name were sold to Samuel Rubin for the marketing of perfume. The brand name was then resold in 1964 to cosmetics company Rayette Inc., which changed its name to Rayette-Fabergé Inc. As the name was resold more times, Fabergé companies launched clothing lines, the cologne Brut, the perfume Babe, hair products, and also undertook film production. The brand changed hands a few more times, and jewellery was eventually added back to the product lines.
context_section_description: Amongst Fabergé’s more popular creations were the miniature hardstone carvings of people, animals and flowers carved from semi-precious or hardstones and embellished with precious metals and stones.  The most common animal carvings were elephants and pigs but included custom made miniatures of pets of the British Royal family and other notables. The flower sculptures were complete figural tableaus, which included small vases in which carved flowers were permanently set, the vase and "water" were done in clear rock crystal (quartz) and the flowers in various hardstones and enamel.  The figures were typically only 25–75 mm long or wide, with some larger and more rare figurines reaching 140–200 mm tall, and were collected throughout the world; the British Royal family has over 250 items in the Royal Collection, including pieces made by Michael Perkhin and Henrik Wigström. Other important Fabergé miniature collectors were Marjorie Merriweather Post, her niece Barbara Hutton and even Fabergé's competitor Cartier, who in 1910 purchased a pink jade pig and a carnelian (agate) fox with cabochon ruby eyes set in gold.
caption: Purple amethyst cane handle by Fabergé with white enamel, rose and yellow gold, and a string of pearls. Circa 1890–1898
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