Temperatures in Paris were nudging 41C when Erwan Leo opened Le Butter Shop this summer. Wildfires had already been tearing through France and the city was quiet, particularly in the less touristy 15th arrondissement, a flex-your-wealth area near the Eiffel Tower. The last thing it needed, you would think, was a shop that sold loads of butter. “We were just so worried about the fridges,” says Leo, the 34-year-old owner. “We didn’t think anyone would even turn up.”
I visit Le Butter, the first shop in Paris dedicated to selling the stuff, two months later in September. It’s a quaint, photogenic spot between a wine shop that was opened by Leo eight years ago and a cafe famous for being blown up in Christopher Nolan’s Inception. Inside there are candy-striped walls, little shopping baskets, a shelf of Instagrammable buttery merch (knives, hats, totes) and two double fridges containing 50 different types of butter. It’s a lot cooler today; the fridges purr away at an exacting 3C. And the past few months have been busy – so much so that Leo has had to erect a bench for those waiting outside, and a retractable barrier to manage the queues.
