The first Faberge egg was made by Peter Carl Faberge in 1885. Only 50 original Faberge eggs were ever completed, constructed by the House of Faberge for the Russian Czars between 1885 and 1917 to commemorate Easter.

The company was closed down by the Bolsheviks in 1917 after the October Revolution. No further eggs were made until 1989 when a licence to design and market them was awarded to jeweller Victor Mayer, of Pforzheim, Germany, in 1989.

The immaculate detail and quality of the original eggs led to them achieving worldwide fame, and a reputation as a byword for luxury. The appearance of the eggs varied wildly, and are all based around an individual theme.

Arguably the most famous is the Coronation Egg, manufactured in 1893 to mark the coronation of Czar Nicholas II the following year. It was sold at auction in 2004 for an estimated $24m. It has featured in two films, the Bond movie Octopussy saw a fake version mysteriously appear at a party at the British Embassy in Berlin, while Oceans Twelve revolves around a plot to steal the egg from a museum and replace it with a holographic image of itself.