Fabergé after the Revolution

The name Fabergé continues to this day as a commercial entity through both the relatives of its founder and through various corporations that, for the most part, have had no connection to the family. By any account, however, the name at this time has lost a significant amount of the luster that it acquired during the decades that it was headed by Peter Carl Fabergé.

With the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917, Fabergé knew that there not be a customer base in the new Russia for the luxury items he produced, so he turned his business over to the care of the director of the Hermitage (it was eventually nationalized and run by a “Committee of the Employees of the Company Faberge” before it went out of business) and fled the country with what members of his family that he could. After first escaping to Riga, in Latvia, he eventually settling in Lausanne, Switzerland where he died on September 24, 1920, never having gotten over the tragedy of having lost his business, his country, and, temporarily, his two sons Alexander and Agathon, who were imprisoned for a time by the Bolsheviks.

The two sons would eventually flee Russia as well. Agathon was finally able to escape in 1927, and Alexander had gained his liberty when a friend bribed guards at the place where he was being held prisoner. In 1924 he and his brother Eugéne opened Fabergé et Cie in Paris, where they had a modest success making the types of items that their father had made years before. The also sold jewelry and had a sideline repairing and restoring the items that had been made by the original House of Fabergé. Fabergé et Cie continued to operate in Paris, at least until the mid ‘80s, but without having had any involvement with the family for several years.

At about the time that Fabergé et Cie was developing in Paris, the name was being taken down a new path – on that had no relation to its illustrious past. In the 1920’s, the American oil billionaire Armand Hammer visited Russian and had become enamored by the items that were produced by the House of Fabergé. He became a noted collector, and when his friend Samuel Rubin was looking for a name for a new cosmetics firm that he was in the process of creating, Hammer suggested the name Fabergé. Rubin liked the idea, and the American firm Fabergé, Inc. was established, but without the knowledge of the Fabergé family. Although the products produced by Rubin generally appealed to an upscale market, when the family was made aware of how their name was being used (although this didn’t happen until after WWII), they sued to regain control of it. Without the means to continue a protracted lawsuit, however, the lawsuit was settled in 1951 for $25,000 (about $215,000 today) in favor of Rubin, with the result being that the commercial use of the name Fabergé was to remain out of the family for the next fifty-five years.

Rubin developed the company successfully and sold it in 1964 for $26 million to the cosmetics maker Rayette. Rayette marketed itself to appeal to a more mainstream clientele, and introduced many products that made Fabergé a household name. Many of these products were advertised using popular entertainers of the day, including a famous series of television commercials for Brut men’s cologne that featured actress Farrah Fawcett and the football player Joe Namath. It was during this time that the name perhaps reached its nadir, when Hollywood and Babe the Farmer’s Daughter, personalities from GLOW (the Glamour Ladies of Wrestling), appeared during the 1980’s performing their craft on commercials for Fabergé Organic Shampoo – the name had clearly lost touch with its origins.

Rayette sold the company in 1984 to McGregor, who eliminated several of Rayette’s products and introduced several of its own – remaining the owner for only the next five years.

Enter Unilever, and Anglo-Dutch firm, who purchased the brand $1.55 billion in 1989. Unilever was the first company in over 70 years to recognize the magic they had acquired in the name of Fabergé. Although they continued to market cosmetics under the moniker, in 1999 they appointed Victor Mayer as workmaster to oversee the creation of Fabergé-inspired jewelry. A cursory examination of the website suggests that with Mayer, the name is edging back toward its original status.

The Fabergé family has not been entirely out of the picture for all of this time. Although for years, as we’ve noted elsewhere, they have not had the legal right to use their name on any commercial venture, several members of the family have tried to keep their traditions alive. Tatiana Fabergé has become a noted expert on the history of her family and has authored several books on the subject. The late Theo Fabergé, the grandson of Peter Carl, and his daughter Sarah created the St. Petersburg Collection, a group of products inspired by the items produced by Peter Carl Faberge. The St. Petersburg Collection was introduced at Marshall Field’s in Chicago in 1984 and is still being produced.

Works by the original House of Fabergé are offered from time to time at prestigious auction houses around the world, including Christie’s and Sotheby’s. Several business, including La Vielle Russie in New York, Wartski’s in London, and Romanov Russia in Chicago, are also dedicated to providing his work to their discriminating clientele.

Today, Fabergé does a thriving business on Ebay. On a recent Sunday afternoon, a selection of 497 items were offered, including everything from a diamond encrusted enameled box by Michael Perchin (workmaster) from New York (“buy it now for $129,000”) to a miniature picture frame featuring a painting of Czar Nicholas II, current bid $.99 (“reserve not met”). Apparently the magic of the name now carries over to more mundane products, including half used bottles of perfume, Barbie Doll clothes, rubber stamps, stickers (“reduced to $.74, shipping $.50”) which were some of the more common items that one supposes Fabergé never imagined would be attached to his name. Perhaps the best advice for protecting onself from the onslaught of Fabergé junk and fauxbergé (a humorous term coined by Dr. Geza von Habsburg, the noted Fabergé authority to refer to the plethora of fakes invading the market) would be caveat emptor, as is encouraged by this offering: “Cute Metalic (sic) Cloissone (sic) Golden Egg, Decorated wit (sic) Colorfull (sic) flowers, from China [!], Fabergé style $7.99 (no bids) ”.

There is hopeful news on the horizon. From a press release by Pallinghurst Resources, a mining investment firm, dated January 3^rd, 2007:

“Acquisition of the Fabergé name from Unilever

Pallinghurst Resources LLP announce completion of a transaction [for $450 million] entered into on 22^nd December whereby Unilever’s entire global portfolio of trademarks, licenses and associated rights relating to the Fabergé brand name was acquired by a Pallinghurst portfolio company and certain investment partners.

Pallinghurst Resources intends using the Fabergé name to brand precious and semi-precious stones to create the world’s most powerful gemstone brand. In a logical extension to the acquisition, a specialist team is being recruited to establish Fabergé as the world’s most exclusive luxury goods brand.”

Tatiana Fabergé, along with Theo and Sarah, sit on the advisory board of the new company Fabergé Ltd. Tatiana Fabergé is understandably delighted: “It’s been my life’s ambition to restore the unsurpassed standards of design and workmanship that characterized my great-grandfather’s treasures”, she said.

We’ll have to wait and see. Pallinghurst announced on October 10, 2007, that it had appointed Mr. Mark Dunhill as CEO of Fabergé Ltd. It remains to be seen if an executive whose main job it has been to protect the bottom line will have the dedication to good taste and the passion for quality that made the House of Fabergé what it was under Peter Carl Fabergé.