Matryoshka - nesting doll is the most famous Russian souvenir, which is popular with everyone, it is considered to be a phenomenon in the world culture. Here we represent matryoshkas made in different parts of Russia and also Russian traditional dolls which can tell you a lot about our history, customs and culture.
Gzhel
Gzhel is the name of a major ceramics center situated some fifty kilometers southeast of Moscow. Historical chronicles note that the dominant pursuit of the local population was the making of pottery, for which reason the very name of Gzhel derives in all likelihood from the Russian verb zhech which means burn in the sense of firing clay. Though the secrets of the craft were handed down from generation to generation long before, Gzhel really rose to fame as a large center of ceramics in the eighteenth century when local potters mastered the making of majolica or majolica tin-glazed earthenware.
Russian Watches
The 70 years of experience in watch production have created a unique industrial environment combining the best traditions of mechanical watch and movement manufacturing and the modern technological philosophy. Watches and movements produced by the factory have always met and still meet extremely high quality requirements, because in addition to serving for civil needs they were used to equip the soviet army.
Today the "First Moscow Watch Factory" produces 250,000 mechanical watches and movements per year, and specialises in the production of mechanical chronographs with different functions.
Russian traditional handicrafts
Russian traditional handicrafts have very rich history and acquired talents and efforts of many generations of Russian masters. The secrets of their art were delivered from farther to son, and the quality of these products absorbed the experience of tens of generations. Russian gifts and souvenirs are very popular and widely known not only in Russia; they are known and highly appreciated abroad.
Russian gifts and souvenirs are distinguished by their variety and diversity of souvenirs from other countries since they reflect originality of cultures of multinational Russian Federation. Among the famous Russian handicrafts there are such as Khokhloma, Kholui lacquered boxes, Orenburg shawls, Zhostovo trays and Vologda lace. Matryoshkas, Faberge style eggs, icons, porcelain, watches, samovars, Russian army items -all these is associated with Russian gifts and souvenirs.
Golden Khokhloma
The Khokhloma painting on wooden articles is, perhaps, the one type of Nizhni Novgorod folk craft that became most popular in Russia and foreign countries. The Khokhloma handicraft became known as early as the 18th century. "Local woodland used to be f source of community welfare. The abundance of wood allows some villagers to manufacture by turning various dishes, cups, plates, and other similar wooden articles", which are then "varnished and decorated all over with golden ornaments and bright flowery patterns". The geographer concluded, "The articles are light in weight, solid, and well proportioned and the black and yellow varnishes they brew from the linseed oil are very strong and clear".
Russian Shawls
Shawls have been a part of traditional Russian Women’s costumes since the 18th Century. The original home of the shawl was Kashmir in India. In the 19th century, Russian manufacturers introduced worsted weaving yarns and began producing their own garments. The most well known Russian shawls are those made in Pavlovo Posad factory, shawls which are very colourful and have an extensive variety of designs, Orenburg shawls that date back as far as the 17th century and made entirely by hand. They are handspuned and handknitted from the finest down of goats in the region of Orenburg near Ural Mountains.
Zhostovo Trays
The village of Zhostovo outside Moscow has become a symbol of unique Russian folk art. For more than 150 years many of its inhabitants have been developing the skill of decorating trays. Their skillful hands have turned this household utensil into a work of art.
Bouquets or garden and field flowers strewn against the black background adorn these trays, giving people joie-de-vivre and awakening admiration over the beauty and diversity of nature. Every human being shares these feelings, and therefore few people remain indifferent to the Zhostovo craft, which has long become world famous.
Zhostovo wares belong to the family of Russian lacquers, whose history goes back to the emergence of miniature lacquer painting on papier-mache in the village of Danilkovo near Fedoskino in the Moscow Region, in the late 18th century.
The tray as a household utensil had been known since times immemorial, but in the 19th century the demand for trays rose as a result of the growth of cities and the expansion of the network of hotels, eateries and bars, where trays were used both for their immediate purpose and as interior decorations. It was that new market that enabled the Zhostovo masters to establish themselves as a distinctive tray-making industry.
Every tray was usually handled by three craftsmen - a smith, who produced shapes, a spatler, who covered the tray with a layer of ground, and a painter, who did the painting. After the tray was dried, the ground-worker covered it with lacquer. In the beginning the workshop master and members of his family worked on a par with other employees.
As the Zhostovo craftsmen expanded production, they took account of and absorbed the experience of other tray-makers. They were prompted the idea of replacing papier-mache with metal, which was hardier, by trays from Nizhny Tagil, which had become a well-known production in the 17th century. Those masters were making large trays painted from original canvasses or engravings.
The Zhostovo masters admired the virtuoso mastery of St. Petersburg trays and learned from them the art of decorative still life, also adapting it to fit their own wares. Along with absorbing some of the techniques of other tray-makers, the Zhostovo craftsmen primarily tried to develop their own style of decorative floral compositions. Local artistic traditions and the creative development of the main accomplishments of other crafts enabled Zhostovo craftsmen to evolve their original style and a unique system of the local craft that are manifest in every piece dating to that period.
The Zhostovo masters painted their trays on colored and golden backgrounds as well as on black and white ones. The surface of the tray was prepared with bronze or aluminum dust which, showing through lacquer, shone like gold and resembled the famous Khokhloma wares. The colors looked especially vibrant against the golden background and the tray seemed a really precious item.
Russian Samovars
For more than 250 years, the samovar has occupied an honoured place in Russian homes as the centrepiece of the table, around which life revolved. It remains most stable attribute of domestic coziness. Step by step a peculiar ritual of tea-drinking emerged and was adopted in every Russian homes. Drinking tea from the samovar was a way of life.
A traditional samovar consists of a large metal container with a faucet and a metal pipe running up through the center. The pipe is filled with solid fuel to heat the water in the surrounding container and the teapot placed on top. The teapot is used to brew the zavarka, a strong concentrate of tea. The tea is served by diluting this concentrate with kipyatok (boiling water) from the main container at a ratio of about 10 parts water to one part tea concentrate.
Since the mid-18th Century, the samovar (Russian teapot, literally from the Russian "sam" (self) and "varit" (to boil)), glowing hot and polished to a sparkle, was an indispensable feature of every day life.
Since its introduction to Russia from China, tea has become a cultural staple. The samovar came to Russia from Persia and the Middle East in the 18th century.
In old Russia tea quickly replaced favorite Russian drink - sbiten (mix of hot water, honey and herbs) and became a popular product. Tea was drunk all day long - you could find hot tea sellers on street corners, in trains, in offices. The samovars became the symbol of Russian hospitality and family comfort as well as the sign of prosperity. Some families held two samovars, one, more plain, for everyday use, and a dearer one - for receptions and festivities. There were homes with separate samovar-rooms whose interior was crowned by the samovar. Russian people wanted something special and began to decorate and develop the samovar into a beautiful work of art, as welcome in the Winter Palace as in a peasant's izba (hut).
The first samovar was made in Tula in 1820. Later samovar manufactures were in many regions, but Tula became known as the centre of Russian samovar production.
Nowdays Russians still use the samovar quite often, but mostly as an attribute of exotics and nostalgia. Samovars are a necessary feature of the Russian mode of life and consequently a part of Russian applied art.
However modern technology has provided for electric samovars, which don't require the use of charcoal. As in old, these samovars are found in kitchens, offices, and even on Russian Trains. And the use of the samovar has spread from Russia to much of Eastern Europe.
Every samovar with hand painting has its own style and is not only article of arts and crafts, but also a good remembering gift.
Vologda Lace
Vologda region is known as a breeding ground of arts and crafts in the Russian North. In XIX-XX centuries there were highly developed such handicrafts as carving and painting of wood and birch bark, fancy weaving and needlework, niello and ceramics. But what became really world famous was Vologda lace. Since the end of XVIII century lace making developed both in Vologda-town and region. Vologda laces were always notable for their characteristic ornaments. Their lines are smooth and flowing. Even geometrical patterns become rounded. Their design is generalized, it often has just a hint of a real prototype. The main feature of those laces is delicacy. Local lace makers created lots of transparent nets that served as ground and types of laces that looked like a frosty window or blossoming garden, or a meadow full of flowers. But they are not spider web like. Made of firm flax or cotton threads, Vologoda lace are strong and weighty. in the 19th century the Vologodians exhibited their works in Europe.
At the same time in many districts of Vologda province women wore ancient folk costumes: shirts with decorated hems, skirts with laces and woven ornaments. Snow-white multipair laces were supplemented with bright colored threads that called over the bright colors of ornamented cloth. Women often put on shirts with decorated hems in haymaking time and for other kinds of collective labor. An expert in vologodsky laces S. A. Davydova describes one of the local customs. Soon after her marriage, the bride put on her best dress and countless shirts with decorated hems and went to show herself. Older women examined delicacy of her dress to see how skillful she was in needlework and lace making. But it's hard to put on too many shirts. So brides often prepared just lavishly adorned hems and put them on like underskirts. One young woman came to having on 17 skirts.
In the Vologda museum can see wonderful albums containing samples of laces. Refined patterns marked by the obvious influence of modernist style - variations of flower bows, butterflies and dragon-flies as well as especially delicate exact laces, braids of handkerchiefs and serviettes were probably accepted by Vologda lace makers, with the help of practical school graduates. Along with the designer's patterns a thick stratum of real folk art existed. Thousands of lace makers used those traditional ornaments, transforming them for changing times and fashions.
Lace making is one of the most laborious and time-consuming handicrafts. Though the process of weaving looks like 'a sort of fun it requires extreme patience, accuracy and good taste. And those who do not copy samples, but create them, often spend months searching after fresh idea. They produce mountings of drafts and sketches of the whole thing and all its parts. Each detail, every figure, curl and flower then are woven to try different ways, colors, materials. When the whole picture is ready on a big list of paper, the designer has to work on technology to find the right place for each pin. When this is over, lace makers start weaving itself. Big articles are made by teams and need weeks and months of hard work. Lace making tradition in Vologda survived through hard times.
Russian Linen
Linen adds that natural beauty and improves its qualities as a fabric with years - the more you use your linen products the softer, more absorbent they become. Quality of Russian linen is well known around the world. These items are authentic; hand made, not machine-made stunning pieces, something that can be passed down to generations. This Russian linen will be for sure an excellent addition for your house decoration and will make your home even more beautiful and cosy. We are proud to bring this high quality fine linen from Russia, which will surely create the special atmosphere!
Russian Icon Painting
In the world of art Russian icons represent a unique and extremely valuable phenomenon. Any icon is far more than a mere visual image, though. Icons are objects of veneration, treated with profound respect. In Greek, “icon” means “image” or “likeness.” The principle underlying the icon is the doctrine that God became visible in Christ and was thus for the first time able to be depicted. According to legend, the first icon painter was the apostle Luke. For the believer, the icon provides a means of seeing and, in a sense, communicating with the holy figure it portrays. However, while an icon is venerated, it is not itself the object of worship. Legends of the miraculous appearance of icons take their place in mediaeval chronicles alongside accounts of the most important events.
Icons were not only a part of decoration of a church but a vital element of everyday life. Contemporary sources tell us that mediaeval icons, and also the frescoes painted directly onto the walls and ceilings of churches, served the common people as a " book for the illiterate".
The saints were always recognizable in icons, their face at times so dissimilar that they might be taken to be portraits with startling power, even now to convey individuality.
Lacquer Painting - Palekh
The unbelievably colorful Palekh souvenirs are known in all countries of the world. The elegant black-lacquered art pieces on which the heroes of Russian folklore come to life - the amazing fire-birds and the gold-manned troikas subjugate us with fairy tale-like world of beauty, movement and harmony of their color chords.
The village of Palekh is stretches widely out among the woods and fields in a picturesque corner of the Ivanovo county. In the XV century it was a part of the Vladimir-Susdal lands and was one of the first ancient centers of icon drawing trade. In the XVII-XVIII centuries Palekh's craftsmen became the most famous in the icon business. They worked out a style all of their own which can be distinguished by the fine line tempera drawing saturated with gold. Their work was valued for the depth of its images and for their fairy-tale-like ornamental design.
Lacquer Painting - Fedoskino
The village of Fedoskino, situated 40km north of Moscow on the picturesque banks of the Ucha River, is Russia's oldest centre of lacquer miniature painting. At least half of the inhabitants of this village and the neighboring ones are in one way or another connected with the traditional craft. The secrets of making and painting papier-mache lacquers have for 200 years now been passed from one generation to another. The French word "papier-mache" (literally "chewed paper") is well-rooted in the Russian language. Several layers of pasted cardboard, boiled in linseed oil and then repeatedly dried in a hot oven, form an original material - hard as wood, light and waterproof - that can be sawed, polished, primed and lacquered. In the 18lh through the 19lh century papier-mache was widely used to make sundry items from peaks for the Russian army headdress to trays, tables and even chandeliers. Needless to say, all sorts of papier-mache caskets and boxes used to store matches, stamps, cards, glasses and above all snuff were immensely popular.
Faberge Jewellery
A Faberge egg is one of 56 jewelry Easter eggs made by Peter Carl Faberge of the Faberge company between 1884 and 1917. The eggs are among the masterpieces of the jeweler’s art.
The Faberge eggs began with an Easter egg made for the czar that became a gift for his wife, Czarina Maria. The egg reminded the empress of her homeland, and so from then on it was agreed that Faberge would make an Easter egg each year for Maria. Faberge designed Easter eggs for another eleven years until Alexander III died. Then Nicholas II, Alexander's son, continued the tradition. It was agreed that the Easter gift would always have an egg shape and would hold a surprise. The surprise was always kept secret.
Fifty six Imperial eggs were made, forty-four of which have been located today and another two that are known to have been photographed. Another twelve Easter eggs were commissioned by Alexander Ferdinandovich Kelch, a Siberean gold mine owner. However, the Imperial Easter egg collection commissioned by the last of the Russian Czars is the most celebrated.
Today just 10 eggs were still in Russia, all on display at the Kremlin Armory Museum. Another nine were purchased by Viktor Vekselberg in February 2004 from the Forbes family in New York city. Smaller collections are in the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, New Orleans Museum of Art, and other museums around the world. Four eggs are in private collections, and eight are still missing.
Russian Traditional Toys
The toy-making trade was in a deep crisis in the first years after the establishment of the Soviet regime in Russia. The demand for toys sharply dropped during the years of revolutionary upheavals and the civil war. At the same time, the toys handmade by craftsmen were intensely pushed out from the market by the factory-made dolls and the mass-produced metal toys.
Luka Kotikov, the renowned toy craftsmen from the village of Fedoseevo (Nizhegorodskaya oblast), made a defiant demonstration of his unhappiness with the state of the toy trade by staging a comical "funeral" of himself. He declared that he had "nothing to live for if toys are no longer needed". After a symbolically staged funeral of himself at a cemetery that was almost across the road from his house he erected on his "grave" a monument with the inscription that L.V. Kotikov was buried there. The monument was a toy wind rural regions. In the Soviet period that started in 1917 and ended in the late eighties the handmade toy trade prospered largely at the centers of folk arts and crafts. The privately owned toy workshops and independent craftsmen manufacturing traditional toys were obliged to join folk arts and crafts cooperatives or state-owned enterprises under the Soviet regime.
The village of Bogorodskoe in the Moscow region became a major center of manufacturing of the carved wooden toys. The "Bogorodskoe Wood Carver" cooperative was set up in the village in 1923 and the school of wood carving art was established there where the students were trained by the best craftsmen in whose families the skills were passed on from one generation to another. The Bogorodskoe wood carving traditions, style, and motifs were preserved in their totality as an art. The Soviet government allowed the trade to live and develop for several decades because the folk art was rooted in the peasant environment. The Bogorodskoe toys depicting wild animals, cattle, and scenes of rural life presented no ideological threat to the regime. Such toys as "Blacksmiths", "Tea drinkers", "Cattle herd", "Three horses",mill with images of the characters from children's fairy tales on its vanes.
Matryoshka - nesting doll is the most famous Russian souvenir, which is popular with everyone, it is considered to be a phenomenon in the world culture. Here we represent matryoshkas made in different parts of Russia and also Russian traditional dolls which can tell you a lot about our history, customs and culture.
Gzhel is the name of a major ceramics center situated some fifty kilometers southeast of Moscow. Historical chronicles note that the dominant pursuit of the local population was the making of pottery, for which reason the very name of Gzhel derives in all likelihood from the Russian verb zhech which means burn in the sense of firing clay. Though the secrets of the craft were handed down from generation to generation long before, Gzhel really rose to fame as a large center of ceramics in the eighteenth century when local potters mastered the making of majolica or majolica tin-glazed earthenware.
The 70 years of experience in watch production have created a unique industrial environment combining the best traditions of mechanical watch and movement manufacturing and the modern technological philosophy. Watches and movements produced by the factory have always met and still meet extremely high quality requirements, because in addition to serving for civil needs they were used to equip the soviet army.
Russian traditional handicrafts have very rich history and acquired talents and efforts of many generations of Russian masters. The secrets of their art were delivered from farther to son, and the quality of these products absorbed the experience of tens of generations. Russian gifts and souvenirs are very popular and widely known not only in Russia; they are known and highly appreciated abroad.
The Khokhloma painting on wooden articles is, perhaps, the one type of Nizhni Novgorod folk craft that became most popular in Russia and foreign countries. The Khokhloma handicraft became known as early as the 18th century. "Local woodland used to be f source of community welfare. The abundance of wood allows some villagers to manufacture by turning various dishes, cups, plates, and other similar wooden articles", which are then "varnished and decorated all over with golden ornaments and bright flowery patterns". The geographer concluded, "The articles are light in weight, solid, and well proportioned and the black and yellow varnishes they brew from the linseed oil are very strong and clear".
Shawls have been a part of traditional Russian Women’s costumes since the 18th Century. The original home of the shawl was Kashmir in India. In the 19th century, Russian manufacturers introduced worsted weaving yarns and began producing their own garments. The most well known Russian shawls are those made in Pavlovo Posad factory, shawls which are very colourful and have an extensive variety of designs, Orenburg shawls that date back as far as the 17th century and made entirely by hand. They are handspuned and handknitted from the finest down of goats in the region of Orenburg near Ural Mountains.
The village of Zhostovo outside Moscow has become a symbol of unique Russian folk art. For more than 150 years many of its inhabitants have been developing the skill of decorating trays. Their skillful hands have turned this household utensil into a work of art.
For more than 250 years, the samovar has occupied an honoured place in Russian homes as the centrepiece of the table, around which life revolved. It remains most stable attribute of domestic coziness. Step by step a peculiar ritual of tea-drinking emerged and was adopted in every Russian homes. Drinking tea from the samovar was a way of life.
Vologda region is known as a breeding ground of arts and crafts in the Russian North. In XIX-XX centuries there were highly developed such handicrafts as carving and painting of wood and birch bark, fancy weaving and needlework, niello and ceramics. But what became really world famous was Vologda lace. Since the end of XVIII century lace making developed both in Vologda-town and region. Vologda laces were always notable for their characteristic ornaments. Their lines are smooth and flowing. Even geometrical patterns become rounded. Their design is generalized, it often has just a hint of a real prototype. The main feature of those laces is delicacy. Local lace makers created lots of transparent nets that served as ground and types of laces that looked like a frosty window or blossoming garden, or a meadow full of flowers. But they are not spider web like. Made of firm flax or cotton threads, Vologoda lace are strong and weighty. in the 19th century the Vologodians exhibited their works in Europe.
Linen adds that natural beauty and improves its qualities as a fabric with years - the more you use your linen products the softer, more absorbent they become. Quality of Russian linen is well known around the world. These items are authentic; hand made, not machine-made stunning pieces, something that can be passed down to generations. This Russian linen will be for sure an excellent addition for your house decoration and will make your home even more beautiful and cosy. We are proud to bring this high quality fine linen from Russia, which will surely create the special atmosphere!
In the world of art Russian icons represent a unique and extremely valuable phenomenon. Any icon is far more than a mere visual image, though. Icons are objects of veneration, treated with profound respect. In Greek, “icon” means “image” or “likeness.” The principle underlying the icon is the doctrine that God became visible in Christ and was thus for the first time able to be depicted. According to legend, the first icon painter was the apostle Luke. For the believer, the icon provides a means of seeing and, in a sense, communicating with the holy figure it portrays. However, while an icon is venerated, it is not itself the object of worship. Legends of the miraculous appearance of icons take their place in mediaeval chronicles alongside accounts of the most important events.
The unbelievably colorful Palekh souvenirs are known in all countries of the world. The elegant black-lacquered art pieces on which the heroes of Russian folklore come to life - the amazing fire-birds and the gold-manned troikas subjugate us with fairy tale-like world of beauty, movement and harmony of their color chords.
The village of Fedoskino, situated 40km north of Moscow on the picturesque banks of the Ucha River, is Russia's oldest centre of lacquer miniature painting. At least half of the inhabitants of this village and the neighboring ones are in one way or another connected with the traditional craft. The secrets of making and painting papier-mache lacquers have for 200 years now been passed from one generation to another. The French word "papier-mache" (literally "chewed paper") is well-rooted in the Russian language. Several layers of pasted cardboard, boiled in linseed oil and then repeatedly dried in a hot oven, form an original material - hard as wood, light and waterproof - that can be sawed, polished, primed and lacquered. In the 18lh through the 19lh century papier-mache was widely used to make sundry items from peaks for the Russian army headdress to trays, tables and even chandeliers. Needless to say, all sorts of papier-mache caskets and boxes used to store matches, stamps, cards, glasses and above all snuff were immensely popular.
A Faberge egg is one of 56 jewelry Easter eggs made by Peter Carl Faberge of the Faberge company between 1884 and 1917. The eggs are among the masterpieces of the jeweler’s art.
The toy-making trade was in a deep crisis in the first years after the establishment of the Soviet regime in Russia. The demand for toys sharply dropped during the years of revolutionary upheavals and the civil war. At the same time, the toys handmade by craftsmen were intensely pushed out from the market by the factory-made dolls and the mass-produced metal toys.