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Serena Kutchinsky was 10 years old when her jeweller father Paul unveiled his masterpiece to the world: a giant, golden, diamond-encrusted egg. Paul had recently taken over the family business, the celebrated London jewellers House of Kutchinsky, and wanted to make his mark, commissioning the production of a spectacular jewelled object like no other. The egg was crafted from 15kg of solid gold, decorated with over 20,000 rare pink diamonds, and put on sale for £7m – today’s equivalent of around $30m. After it was completed, the egg was finally unveiled to the public at Basel Art Fair in April 1990 before heading on a ‘world tour’ to find a buyer. But it soon became apparent that there was a problem: no one wanted to buy it. Paul had gambled his century-old family business on the egg, but within a year of its making the firm had crumbled and Serena’s family had fallen apart. The egg itself would be repossessed by the company that had supplied its dazzling pink diamonds. No one in the Kutchinsky family would speak of the egg for years – until decades later, Serena went looking for it.

Presenter: Jo Fidgen
Producer: Zoe Gelber

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(Photo: Paul Kutchinsky with his golden egg in 1990. Credit: Kutchinsky family archive)