The colour-drenched cult of Le Creuset

The French cookware powerhouse, which is turning 100, has inspired generations of home chefs and fans who feverishly hunt for their favourite shapes and shades

- Julia Moskin

NEW YORK - Ms April Hershberger is not the only collector of Le Creuset cookware who owns so many pieces that she cannot count them.

But she may be the only one who built an entire house around one: the deep-red, 9-quart (about 8.5 litres) oval Dutch oven she received as a gift for her 2006 wedding. It sparked an obsession.

She had her kitchen stove, the centrepiece of her home in a restored barn in south-eastern Pennsylvania, custom-made to match her collection of Le Creuset cherry-red pots, baking dishes, pitchers, plates and more.

The 42-year-old also has pieces in mustard yellow and sunflower yellow, Mediterranean blue and Caribbean blue, forest green and lime green, which she frequently arranges and rearranges into stripes, swirls and rainbows, documenting it all on Instagram.

"I could never commit to one colour," she said.

Like French luxury fashion houses Hermes and Chanel, Le Creuset (luh cruh-SAY, according to the official video, meaning French for crucible) is a Gallic legacy brand that has flourished in the modern global marketplace by becoming collectible while also remaining functional. And collectors have turned what was once a niche brand into a near-cult, perpetually entranced by new lines, colours and shapes.

Some stick to a colour family, such as pastels. Others focus on a single item across the spectrum, such as trivets or pie birds.

"As an Aries, fire and flames speak to me," said Ms Arlene Robillard, a purist who has one of the world's largest collections of the company's original colour: Volcanique, an orange-red ombre sold in the United States as Flame.