Few biographical details of Vladimir Viacheslav Soloviev are known. He was a master goldsmith with a workshop at 33 Gorokhovaya, St Petersburg. Following the death of Fabergé’s workmaster Theodore Ringe in 1894, Soloviev, in conjunction with Anders Mickelsson, assisted Ringe’s widow, Anna, with the running of the workshop she had inherited. In 1908 they took over the workshop; in 1913, when Mickelsson died, Soloviev became the sole owner. This vesta case, contained in its original silk and velvet-lined holly-wood case, is characteristic of the type of small enamelled objects of function produced by Soloviev.

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