The Big Egg Hunt in London

I’ve loathed eggs since I was seven years old. In those far-flung days I used to take a packed lunch to Halton Primary School, just down the hill from the RAF base where my father worked. 

My mum had read somewhere that it was good for children to eat an egg a day (times have changed), so every morning she lovingly put a hard-boiled egg in my lunch box. I obediently ate them but suddenly the day dawned when I just couldn’t face another. Not ever. And I haven’t eaten an egg, boiled, fried or scrambled, since. I cook with them but when it comes to eating them by themselves, no. I  buy them so rarely that my children regard them as rare delicacies and savour every precious mouthful.

But despite my dislike of eggs I was entranced by the giant eggs I spotted in London this week. With Easter on the horizon, two charities, Elephant Family and Action for Children, have launched The Fabergé Big Egg Hunt. More than 200 beautifully crafted eggs, created by artists, designers, architects and jewellers, have been hidden around the capital.

The idea is that egg hunters can enter a competition to win a diamond jubilee rose gold egg, worth £100,000 and decorated with 60 gemstones (one for each year of the Queen’s reign), by texting a keyword from each egg to 80001. Entries are open till April 3.

Not only that, the decorated eggs, 2ft 6in (74cm) tall and made of fibre glass, will be auctioned for the charities at the end of the hunt.

Anyway, walking through Mayfair with my daughter before the RNA awards on Monday, we came across this beauty. Egg number 126 is the creation of fashion designer Diane von Furstenberg. It's called Love is Life and is perched high above the doorway of the bar at Claridge’s. I still haven’t been converted to eating eggs but finally I've found an egg I like.