The story
Founded by Louis-Ernest Ladurée in 1862, in rue Royale.1
Early years
Louis Ernest Ladurée, a miller, founded a bakery in 1862 on the rue Royale, Paris. During the Paris Commune uprising of 1871, the bakery was burnt down. A pastry shop was built at the same location, and Jules Chéret was entrusted with the interior decoration. The chubby cherubs dressed as pastry cooks, painted by him on the ceiling, form the company's emblem. The interior of the premises were painted in the same celadon colour as the façade.
Ladurée's rise to fame came in 1930 when his little cousin, Pierre Desfontaines, had the original idea of the double-decker, sticking two macaron shells together with a creamy ganache as filling. Queen Catherine de' Medici had brought the macaron to France from Italy in the 16th century, and the recipe for the biscuit had hardly varied over the years, but the amounts of the ingredients used and the appearance of the end product were up to the individual bakers.
French pastry chef Pierre Hermé helped orchestrate the expansion of Ladurée: "In one year Ladurée went from a little bakery in the eighth district of Paris to a big brand name. When I arrived, there was not a lot of organization. I really brought the savoir-faire to the company. When I arrived, they didn't have a logo."
Recent history
In 1993, Groupe Holder took over Ladurée. The Holder family also owns the PAUL bakery chain in France. Following the takeover, the company began an expansion drive to turn Ladurée from the single rue Royale bakery into a chain, setting up pastry shops and tea rooms on the Champs-Élysées and in Le Printemps Haussmann in 1997, followed by Ladurée Bonaparte in 2002.
The international development of Ladurée started in 2005 with London, in the Harrods department store. In 1997, two shops opened in Paris – the first on the Champs-Élysées, next to its tea room, decorated by Jacques Garcia, and the second in the rue Bonaparte, decorated by Roxane Rodriguez. A shop opened in 2006 in London, also decorated by Roxane Rodriguez. The takeaway models of the rue Bonaparte and Harrods stores were exported to their other locations.
Ladurée stores are now also present in Canada, Belgium, India, Ireland, Japan, Kuwait, Luxembourg, Monaco, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Switzerland, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
In 2012, Ladurée released a makeup collection inspired by the colours of their macarons. It became available in Japan in February 2012, and in Europe from November 2012.
In 2019, Ladurée switched to a vegan-only menu at their Beverly Hills location.
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In March 2022 80% of Ladurée was bought by Stephane Courbit through Lov Group. Mélanie Carron became the new managing director, replacing David Holder, the son of the founder of the Holder group.
From Wikipedia’s article on Ladurée, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4