A Midwest scrap dealer stumbled upon the find of a life time at a flea market- one of the eight missing imperial Fabergé eggs made by famed designer Carl Fabergé, worth an estimated $33 million. The gold ridged egg has one diamond and contains a clock. It stands on a yellow gold lion-foot pedestal set with three sapphires that are topped with rose diamond-set bows.
The Imperial Fabergé Egg, found at a Midwestern flea market, is valued at $33 million.
The man bought the egg for $14,000 and hoped to quickly turn it around and sell it for $15,000. He thought he could sell it for more than the gold value because it had a Vacheron Constantin clock in it, but no one was interested in what he had to sell.
The Third Imperial Egg with a Vacheron Constantin timepiece.
So he turned to Google… and what popped up? An article on the eight missing Imperial Faberge eggs and a picture of his egg. With a picture of his find, he went to a London antiques dealer, who flew to the states to verify the remarkable find. The egg was sitting on his kitchen counter next to a cupcake.
The Fabergé Egg, next to a cupcake.
Of the 50 Imperial Easter eggs designed by Fabergé, 42 were accounted for. Of the missing eight, only three were believed to have escaped Russia… and this is one of them. The egg was a gift from Russian emperor Alexander III to Empress Maria Feodorovna on Easter in 1887. During the Russian Revolution, the egg was seized by the Bolsheviks, who had a policy of selling treasure. It’s last known whereabouts were in 1964, when it was sold at an auction house in New York City. How it made its way to a flea market in the midwest, we may never know.
The Third Imperial Fabergé Easter Egg displayed among Marie Feodorovna’s Fabergé treasures in the Von Dervis Mansion Exhibition, St. Petersburg, March 1902 .
The egg will be on exhibited for the first time in 112 years in London next month.
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