Russian czars don’t give gifts like ordinary people.

When it comes to special occasions, it’s go big or go home. So when Czar Alexander III wanted to find the perfect gift for his 20th wedding anniversary to Empress Maria Feodorovna, he turned to Fabergé to craft an Easter egg, something Maria remembered from her childhood. Legend has it that it took Fabergé a year to craft that first in a long line of Imperial Easter eggs that made the House of Fabergé famous.

Four of the 50 Fabergé Imperial Eggs designed for Alexander III and his successor Nicholas II are on display in Fabergé Revealed at the Bellagio Gallery of Fine Art, part of a collection of 238 pieces that covers picture frames made of enamel, tiny animals of all sorts, bell pulls, umbrella and cane handles and, of course, jewel-encrusted brooches and miniature egg pendants. Through the exhibit, you’ll learn the history of the House of Fabergé, Russian czars and how their tastes changed.

The czars never dictated the designs of the eggs when they were commissioned, and the only request was that they feature a surprise inside. The Imperial Pelican Egg in rose gold from 1897, for example, folds out into eight oval frames surrounded by pearls with a pelican on top feeding her young. “A lot of Las Vegas is about the glitz and the glamour,” says Tarissa Tiberti, executive director of the Bellagio Gallery of Fine Art. “With all these things on display, all these big showstoppers in Vegas, I think that Fabergé is right on par with that.”

Three-piece coffee set

Three-piece coffee set

This collection from the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, the largest public one in existence outside of Russia, encompasses the range of Fabergé creations. “It’s like looking inside someone’s home and seeing how they used it,” Tiberti says of the collection. Spending time looking carefully at the pieces reveals how a cup can contain a rooster and a bear, found only when the piece is examined closely. “There are so many details. The more you look at them, the more you find. You just don’t find this craftsmanship now.”

Other delights from the Imperial Easter Egg collection include Peter the Great Easter Egg from 1903, with a multitude of precious metals such as gold, platinum and silver as well as diamonds and rubies, and the stunning Imperial Tsesarevich Easter Egg from 1912, with a lapis lazuli and platinum exterior.

Near the end of the exhibit, find “Fauxbergé” objects, dead ringers for Fabergé pieces, so good that they were once mistaken for the real thing. Most came from Lillian Thomas Pratt, the wife of a General Motors executive in Virginia who collected the pieces. Look closely at the collection and discover if you can tell that they’re fakes. “They were such sought-after items that people would replicate them, passing them off as real Fabergé objects. It’s so interesting to see that they were in such high demand that people were making fakes.”

Bellagio, 10 a.m.-8 p.m. daily, last admission at 7:30 p.m., $17, $14 seniors and Nevada residents, $12 students, children 12 and under free, admission includes audio tour. 702.693.7871