diff --git a/tools/boilerplate/recipe.py b/tools/boilerplate/recipe.py
index 864160e9fcb1646e841e33a1ea11948ae7964d14..1d1939cc4df08313de17d198960f90bb366be0d2 100644
--- a/tools/boilerplate/recipe.py
+++ b/tools/boilerplate/recipe.py
@@ -36,7 +36,7 @@
     'BOILERPLATE_PATH',
     os.path.realpath(os.path.join(os.path.dirname(__file__), 'boilerplate_data')))
 
-TEMPLATES = TemplateLookup(directories=[BOILERPLATE_PATH])
+TEMPLATES = TemplateLookup(directories=[BOILERPLATE_PATH], input_encoding='utf-8')
 
 
 def write(target, contents):