RARE RUSSIAN SILVER KARELIAN BIRCH CIGAR CASE, IVAN KHLEBNIKOV, 1914
The case has a name (Suvorova), place (Harbin) and dated - 1914. BTW, any item from Russian Harbin is very rare (!!) - please see information below.
HALLMARKS: 'KHLEBNIKOV' in Cyrillic for Ivan Khlebnikov - famous Russian jewelry firm - please see information bellow.
PROVENANCE: From a Long Island NY Home.
CONDITION: Used condition. The item is described to the best of our knowledge. Please refer to pictures and email with any questions.
DIMENSIONS: L: 5.5" x W: 3.5" x H: 2" (140 x 90 x 50 mm).
ESTIMATE PRICE: $2,000 - $8,000.
HISTORY of SALES: A few years ago Russian cigar cases from birch were sold on Live Auctioneers, Sotheby's and Christie's for $3,000, $6,800, $7,500 and $30,500 - please see the screenshots.
INVESTMENT: You have a GREAT CHANCE to purchase a unique item for your collection - over the years it will only INCREASE in price.
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WIKIPEDIA: Khlebnikov was an Imperial Russian jewelry firm, founded ca. 1867 by Ivan Khlebnikov in Saint Petersburg, but transferred to Moscow in 1871. The business was highly successful and received the Imperial Warrant producing work of originality and highest quality using decoration in the traditional Russian style on many pieces. Enamel was a speciality especially plique-a-jour, but also cloisonne. Demand for its work was high and in 1882 it employed 200 craftsmen. The business succumbed at the time of the Russian Revolution. Sazikov's successor, Khlebnikov, who opened his Moscow workshop about 1870, won prizes at the great European exhibitions and achieved international fame for enamelled silver. Among the Khlebnikov specialties were silver chasing and casting to simulate wood, birch bark, and fabric. This kind of trompe-l'oeil design was an extremely popular aspect of the pan-Slavic style, and in addition to boxes and cigar cases engraved to look like actual cigar boxes, including their labels and tariff stamps, Khlebnikov and other makers also produced trays and salvers in the form of woven reed fruit baskets, sometimes with a draped napkin and occasionally a leafy fruited twig, entirely done in chased and wrought silver. These were so popular abroad that Tiffany and Company in the United States retailed IMPORTED examples, and firms like Gorham COPIED them for their own market.

WIKIPEDIA: The first generation of Harbin Russians were mostly the builders and employees of the Chinese Eastern Railway. They moved to Harbin in order to work on the railroad. At the time Harbin was not an established city. The city was almost built from scratch by the builders and early settlers. Houses were constructed, furniture and personal items were brought in from Russia. After the plague epidemic, Harbin's population continued to increase sharply, especially inside the Chinese Eastern Railway Zone. Research shows that only 11.5 percent of all residents were born in Harbin. By 1917, Harbin's population exceeded 100,000, with over 40,000 of them were ethnic Russians. After Russia's Great October Socialist Revolution in November 1917, more than 100,000 defeated Russian White Guards and refugees retreated to Harbin, which became a major center of White Russian emigres and the largest Russian enclave outside the Soviet Union. The city had a Russian school system, as well as publishers of Russian-language newspapers and journals. Russian Harbintsy community numbered around 120,000 at its peak in the early 1920s. Many of Harbin's Russians were wealthy, which sometime confused foreign visitors who expected them to be poor, with for instance the American writer Harry A. Franck in his 1923 book Wanderings in North China writing the Russian "ladies as well gowned as at the Paris races [who] strolled with men faultlessly garbed by European standards”, leading him to wonder how they had achieved this "deceptive appearance".

WIKIPEDIA: A birch is a thin-leaved deciduous hardwood tree of the genus Betula in the family Betulaceae, which also includes alders, hazels, and hornbeams. It is closely related to the beech-oak family Fagaceae. The genus Betula contains 30 to 60 known taxa of which 11 are on the IUCN 2011 Red List of Threatened Species. They are a typically rather short-lived pioneer species widespread in the Northern Hemisphere, particularly in northern areas of temperate climates and in boreal climates. Birch wood is fine-grained and pale in colour, often with an attractive satin-like sheen. Ripple figuring may occur, increasing the value of the timber for veneer and furniture-making. The highly decorative Masur (or Karelian) birch, from Betula verrucosa var. carelica, has ripple textures combined with attractive dark streaks and lines.

Used