A SILVER-GILT TRAY FROM THE ORLOFF SERVICE

Nicholls and Plincke produced later additions to the celebrated Orloff Service, one of the greatest commissions of French silver of the eighteenth century. Empress Catherine II ordered the service from the Parisian silversmiths Jacques Roettiers and his son Jacques-Nicolas, which she subsequently presented to her lover and political ally Count Gregory Orloff. The service was supplemented throughout the nineteenth century by the leading silversmiths of St Petersburg, including Carl Tegelsten, Nicholls and Plincke and Morozov. While the service consisted of 3,000 pieces originally, only about 1,000 pieces survived by 1907. See Baron A. de Foelkersam, Inventaire de l'Argenterie conservée dans les garde-meubles des Palais Impériaux, St Petersburg, 1907, II, pp. 61-124. For other pieces from the service, also see Christie's, London, 28 November 2011, lot 317.