• Rare Fabergé Egg Sells for $30.2 Million
• One of Seven Luxurious Eggs

A rare Fabergé egg made of crystal and diamonds, crafted for Russia’s ruling family before the revolution, was sold for a record £22.9 million ($30.2 million) at auction.

Christie’s London auction house stated that the Winter Egg, compared to the famous “Mona Lisa,” is one of only seven luxurious eggs still in private hands.

The egg, about 10 centimeters tall, is made from finely carved crystal, adorned with platinum snowflake motifs and 4,500 tiny diamonds, and opens to reveal a removable basket containing quartz flowers set with gemstones symbolizing spring.

The sale price, including buyer’s fees, surpassed the $18.5 million paid at a 2007 Christie’s auction for another Fabergé egg made for the Rothschild banking family.

Craftsman Peter Carl Fabergé and his company created over 50 eggs for the Russian imperial family between 1885 and 1917, each unique and containing a hidden surprise.

Czar Alexander III began the tradition of giving his wife an egg each Easter, and his successor Nicholas II extended it to include his wife and mother.

Czar Nicholas II commissioned this egg as an Easter gift for his mother, the Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna, in 1913. It was designed by Alma Pihl, who also created another egg owned by the British royal family.

The Romanov family ruled Russia for 300 years before the 1917 revolution, and Nicholas and his family were executed in 1918.

A London dealer bought the egg for £450 when the cash-strapped Soviet authorities sold off some Russian art treasures in the 1920s. It changed hands several times, was considered lost for two decades, then sold at Christie’s in 1994 for over 7 million Swiss francs ($5.6 million), and again in 2002 for $9.6 million.

Margo Oganesian, head of Christie’s Russian art department, called the egg “the ‘Mona Lisa’ of decorative arts,” a superb example of craft and design.

There are 43 surviving imperial Fabergé eggs, most of them in museums.