Peter Carl Fabergé (and Alfred Thielemann)
Box
circa 1929
(gilt metal, guilloché enamel and sapphire)
This box is almost edible. It echoes the look of a vintage bonbon, one whose décor is both inviting and delicate (and of course authentically sweet) and whose colours and shape are simple and soft. The central panel of blue is like a sky whipped with wafts of wispy clouds, ideal for a few leisurely hours of kite-flying or of lying eagle-spread in the grass, guessing the forms of the lazy drifters up above. The pale rose-coloured panel on the right might remind one of bitter raspberry ice cream, of prune jam or of a loathed pair of aged pink socks that have thankfully misplaced themselves. Wet sand, cold milk or clean white bed sheets, creased and warm, may be evoked by the solid creamy panel on the left; within its gold confines the enamel is spread out like a generous helping of margarine on toast, the knife resting nearby on the edge of chipped old plate, spotted with crumbs and lovingly repainted over the generations. The gleam of this box is fine: it is as reflective as that of a shallow, clear puddle of water, similar to those found smattered throughout a meadow after a dense spring shower: crisp, still and scented with the uncanny freshness of a retreating winter. To some, this box may even transform itself into a weird carousel, its six vertical windows rotating slowly to the sound of a tune believed to have been forgotten, each opening and revealing in turn a niche fitted with a memory or thought spurred by something as slight as a colour, smell or sound - strained from all corners of the mind, whether polished or dusty.
