MARKED FABERGÉ, WITH THE WORKMASTER'S MARK OF HENRIK WIGSTRÖM, ST PETERSBURG, 1903-1904, SCRATCHED INVENTORY NUMBER 10844

A similarly designed box by Henrik Wigström, with a moss agate set cover and salmon guilloché enamelled sides, originally acquired by Queen Alexandra is held in the Royal Collection (RCIN 40155). Fabergé's use of moss agate in snuff-box design is an extension of the eighteenth-century fashion for incorporating moss agate in objects of vertu and jewellery of German origin. Fabergé mined the stone in Siberia and also produced enamel patterns to simulate its effect, often in combination with pink enamel (C. de Guitaut, Fabergé in the Royal Collection, London, 2003, p. 131, no. 146).