The Remarkable Jewelry Collection of Madame Ganna Walska

T hroughout her long life, with endless energy and a lively intelligence, Madame Ganna Walska pursued a love of beauty, music, self-realization and personal fulfillment. Between the wars, her personal and professional commitments brought her in close contact with the cultural and social elite on two continents. Never comfortable with the role of socialite, she challenged women’s traditional roles and behavior, courageously living life on her own terms.

Ultimately, Madame Walska’s life journey – which reads like a Hollywood movie – led her to California, where she purchased a large estate in Montecito, just outside of Santa Barbara. In her forty-three years there, she poured into the property the same creative energy, focus, money and flair that she had given to her singing career.

Working alongside notable landscape designers and skilled gardeners, Madame Walska maintained the existing formal gardens, while adding her dramatic style and unique vision to developing new gardens on the estate. Upon her death in 1984, the property was turned over to the Ganna Walska Lotusland Foundation, which she had established in 1958. The garden was opened to visitors on a limited basis in 1993 and is now considered to be one of the top ten gardens in the world.

Madame Ganna Walska’s niece, Hania Tallmadge, says her aunt’s passion for jewelry started in Russia with Fabergé and continued on to Paris and then New York. In her new publication about Madame Walska’s remarkable life, Portraits of an Era, Hania points out “…Fabergé was a hard act to follow, however, Cartier – first in Paris, and later in London and New York—must have pleased her beautifully, because for two decades, with some notable exceptions, she bought there exclusively.”

In 1971, after three years of indecision, Madame Walska was persuaded to sell 146 pieces of her jewelry collection. A letter from Parke-Bernet urged her to allow them to include a paragraph about her in the auction catalogue because:

Among the collection, rich in colored gems, was a ninety-five carat diamond briolette, a rare collection of Indian jewelry featuring several magnificent necklaces by Cartier, and a large Mogul carved emerald. Amid the many auction bidders who bought from the sale were dealers Harry Winston and Van Cleef & Arpels, and important collectors such as Doris Duke. The Cartier coral bracelet was not part of the auction and has stayed in a private collection since her death.

Funds raised by the 1971 sale were sunk back into the garden, to purchase and install the rare Cycads that comprise the last garden created during Madame Walska’s lifetime. Just as Madame Ganna Walska sold her jewels to benefit Lotusland’s growth, the current owner is honoring her legacy of generosity by gifting a portion of the proceeds of the Cartier bracelet to Ganna Walska Lotusland.

Past Auction

Important Jewels

10–16 June 2020 | 10:00 AM EDT | New York