Tiaras, parure sets, brooches, luxurious bracelets, pearls and more pearls – what the Romanov spouses wore

As is well known, most of the Russian empresses were German princesses in their maidenhood. They received a strict upbringing and were not in the habit of bathing in luxury. However, the status of a monarchy required certain canons both in relation to costume and in what concerned accessories and jewelry.

The products of the Faberge company are world famous, and above all the series of Easter eggs made as gifts to the empresses, but there were other jewelers who gained the attention of the court. Thus, one of the main masters working on personal orders for the imperial family was the firm of Eduard Bolin. If we take the total, the empresses had many more Bolin jewelry than products of its main competitor Faberge. Also on the list of jewelers-suppliers to the Court were the workshops of Kekhli and the Ovchinnikov brothers (they were more responsible for table silver and household items).

There were also famous foreigners – the jewelry houses of Cartier and Tiffany & Co. According to the established order at the court, the empresses had personal jewelry and a case of ceremonial jewelry belonging to the treasury (the so-called crown diamonds). The latter was a kind of constant and passed from one monarch to another, but the personal jewelry wardrobe was regularly expanded and replenished.

Empresses could order jewelry themselves, but more often they received it as a gift from their husbands and relatives. It was customary to give jewelry on important dates and family holidays, for example, name days or wedding anniversaries, as well as on significant church holidays, such as Easter or Christmas. Jewelry was also given on special occasions. Thus, Nicholas I presented his wife with a magnificent diamond necklace with opals for the birth of their son, which she loved very much along with pearls and the simplest turquoise.

The “appetites” of the empresses, as well as the desire of their spouses to shower them with jewelry, varied greatly. Thus, the most eager for jewelry were the wives of Alexander III and Nicholas II, Maria Feodorovna and Alexandra Feodorovna, respectively. And Nicholas, in turn, more than once met with the displeasure of the treasury, presenting exorbitant bills for gift jewelry. Thus, it is believed that he is the owner of the most expensive purchase in the history of the imperial family – a unique set of jewelry (parure) with sapphires, made by the Kehli company. It cost the customer more than 200 thousand rubles. Fantastic, if not crazy money for those times! The necklace alone from this parure contained 260 carats of stones.

Maria Feodorovna adored jewelry. She wore them on occasion and without, and knew how to combine them in the most unusual ways. Her collection was constantly growing, and her images were called brilliant in every sense. Many of her ceremonial portraits have been preserved, in which she appears in a new outfit each time. Many of her jewelry ended up in the collections of European royal courts, since she managed to take a significant part of them when she left Russia.

Alexandra Feodorovna also knew how to position herself. The Hesse-Darmstadt princess did not have a large personal fortune. Therefore, immediately after her marriage, a jewelry collection was hastily compiled for her, which she could use in her new status as empress. The firms of Bolin, Faberge, and Kehli carried out orders. The empress acquired all the necessary jewelry: from diamond earrings and pearl sautoirs for every day to grandiose parures with large precious stones. Subsequently, her collection was replenished faster than anyone else at court and eventually consisted of several thousand high-class jewelry. An interesting weakness of the empress: she especially loved pearls, and most of all – pearl… buttons. They were an indispensable gift from her husband on the anniversary of the engagement. By the way, such a trinket could be very expensive. First-class pearls, even in the form of a button, could cost up to 10 thousand rubles.

Pearls

Russian empresses especially loved pearls. The same Alexandra Feodorovna wore several strands of different lengths at a time. Alexandra Feodorovna of Nicholas I wore a spectacular decoration on ceremonial occasions – a cordelier: when strings of pearls were attached to the shoulders and hung like a garland below the waist. Maria Alexandrovna (wife of Alexander II) was famous for her beautiful hair and loved to emphasize the beauty of her hairstyle by weaving strings of pearls into a “crown” of intricately styled curls. The sweet secrets of empresses are interesting: for example, Maria Feodorovna (wife of Alexander III) smoked and therefore had a large collection of cigarette cases. Alexandra Feodorovna, Faberge’s favorite client, adored the Art Nouveau style and brought it into fashion at court.

After the Revolution

After the revolution, the imperial jewels traveled a lot. The story of one of them, which now belongs to… British Queen Elizabeth II, is especially interesting. The diamond tiara, made in the 1840s by the Bolin firm, adorned the pretty head of Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna, the wife of the younger brother of Alexander III, for many years. In 1918, with the help of British diplomats, the jewelry left by the princess in Russia was reunited with its owner. But not for long. In exile, Maria Pavlovna was desperate for money and was forced to sell her favorite jewelry.

The buyer was Queen May, the wife of George V. Thus, the jewelry came into the hands of the British royal dynasty, and is currently the property of Elizabeth. This is just one example of many, many. The imperial jewels, oddly enough, were not kept for long. Even the most beloved ones. They were remade by the owners themselves or by those who inherited them. And under Soviet rule, most of what remained in Russia was sold off and now wanders around the world, occasionally popping up at auctions from private jewelry collections.