Island's French connection continues shop relocation
BUSINESS
BY PETER B. BRACE INDEPENDENT WRITER
The fresh, crusty bread, superior cookware and hand-painted pottery islanders have come to love at Michel and Joyce Berruet's L'Ile de France country store will continue to be available when the couple reopens on Fri., March 30 at their new location at 8 India St.

DON COSTANZO/The Independent L'Ile de France's new space on India Street, alongside Black-Eyed Susan's

The Berruets hit a bump in the road of business when the terms of their lease renewal for their store at 18 Federal St. were unacceptable to them, but they the n learned that J. Pepper Frazier Real Estate, which owns the India Street building, was moving and the spot was open. On Friday, a day that has nothing to do with any French occasions, the Berruets will host a reception from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. when shop visitors may enjoy Michel's homemade duck rillettes with bread or crackers and get a first peek at some of the new items being stocked for this year.

"We wanted to be open as soon as possible," said Joyce Berruet, relishing the flood of light filling the store even on a cloudy day. "Normally, we are open at this time of year with limited hours."

The hours and days the couple would have been required to put in with a new lease with Nantucket Island Resorts was precisely what made them opt to relocate under a different landlord. The new lease would have had them open seven days a week, 10 hours a day from Memorial Day through Columbus Day. Since they run the store alone, that did not sit well with them.

"We decided we wanted to have one day a week at home together," said Michel.

The Berruets first opened their shop in 1996 on South Water Street. "Originally, we were going to work with an interior designer who had a retail space and have a corner there," said Joyce. "That did not develop, so we decided to do the store."

In 1997, the business moved to 18 Federal St. in the center of a three-section building, and then relocated to the end at Chestnut Street in 2000. Except for a part of January and February, when the couple travels to France on buying trips, they operate all year.

"We try to be a year-round store as much as possible, to be part of the year-round community," said Joyce. "I don't like to put up a sign saying, 'Thanks for the great year - we'll see you in the spring.'We consider ourselves a cultural center. We're not just retail store. People come in with things to translate and ask Michel questions."

But on the retail side, the Berruets have some unique and beautiful items, mostly made by families or individual artists they know personally. Such wares include Quimper (pronounced Campare) hand-painted pottery which is sought by collectors and features special just-for-the-Berruets Rainbow Fleet plates and bowls with Nantucket painted on them. Michel pointed out one he has set aside that has a letter missing from the island's name, likely a strange name for French person to write.

Other handmade pottery comes from the husband and wife team of Sampigny, who are commissioned by The Louvre to create their reproductions. There are special mushroom knives with little brushes at one end because the French do not believe in washing white mushrooms; an exclusive line of buttery soft leather bags and belts made by the Mamet family, whose husband used to be a saddlemaker; some old furniture and new butcher block tables; dripless, smokeless candles made by a company established in 1643; and authentic bistro tables with marble tops surrounded by a brass edging and cast iron bases, also an exclusive from the last French factory producing them.

New stock includes wooden kitchen utensils, white porcelain serving dishes and tablecloths, napkins and placemats from a fifth generation family in the Basque region of France.

"This store tries to avoid the cliches of France," explained the couple. "We want to have authentic stuff."

And that includes the 13-inch round, four-pound loaves of bread baked by the Poilane family bakery that is brought in on Thursdays and is made from family-grown wheat without any chemicals, an olive oil from Provence and delicacies such as pears in brandy and a tapenade.

"We plan on running L'Ile de France for a few more years and then we plan on retiring in France," said Joyce. "We're very pleased with our new location. We feel a very good ambiance in the space, and

we are very optimistic about the future." I