From FUGAZZI in Amsterdam to BORNTOSTANDOUT in Seoul, this unexpected collaboration reads less like a business strategy and more like a forbidden romance. Framed as a “second love,” the partnership plays on temptation, duality, and the thrill of straying from the familiar. It’s an olfactory scandal designed to challenge brand loyalty in the fragrance industry. In this collaboration, perfume becomes an invitation to embrace temptation and ask the ultimate question: why settle for one love when you can have two? We got the chance to meet the founders behind two great perfumes and one great collab.
It’s so fun that I have both of you at the same time. You started your collaboration a year ago, and now you have a big pop-up together at Samaritaine, centered around the cheeky concept that it’s okay to cheat on your perfume. First, can you please introduce yourselves to our readers?
Bram: I’m the founder of Fugazzi. I founded it in 2018 after I graduated from fashion school, so I never expected to end up in this industry. I was thinking of doing a fashion brand, but I started falling in love with the fragrance industry after a trip to Egypt; blending for fun, which put the idea in my head to launch a tiny perfume. I didn’t have a big vision; it was very local first, and started from there.
Jun: I’m the founder of BORNTOSTANDOUT, its been four years now. I grew up in Europe and North America, and then I moved to Korea. All cultures are different, and from a European perspective, Korea is dramatically conservative. I try to translate that kind of experience into a brand. In Korea, we have Confucianism, it’s about following social values and social boundaries. I was naturally perceived as a rebel living in Korea. I wanted to translate who I am as a person as a message to convey to the people of Korea, that you’re not living to fit into society but to live your own life. Hence the reason why our bottle is white versus red. White is a symbol of purity, the symbol of conservatism in Korea, versus red, a color of taboo.
What was it that engaged you with perfume?
Bram: The emotion.
Jun: I fell in love with perfume twenty-four years ago in elementary school. I’ve been collecting perfumes ever since.
How did you discover perfumes so young?
Jun: You’re a boy when you’re a boy, what do you seek? Attention. And perfume was like a magic potion that’s just in front of you, because you feel as if you wear that perfume, more attention would come to you.
It started as a childhood hobby, and now it’s your career.
Jun: Yes, I bought a lot of perfume. Back then, I didn’t have much money, I skipped a couple meals of lunch to save money for my weekend trip to downtown, and I would go to discounters with discontinued perfumes.
How did the two of you meet?
Bram: As two niche perfumes, we had crossed paths many times. I just called him. I thought the brand was cool and loved what he was doing.
You don’t see many collabs between perfumes.
Bram: In fashion its normal, but not between two fragrance brands. I wanted to do the first fragrance collab in the world. When I asked Jun, he said yes, and we started a group chat, and within a couple of weeks we had the design. We were proactive on both sides. It’s literally a crossover, a love story that should not have happened. So that was exactly the point. That was our starting point. We were like, let’s do some fun love story.
How did you bring in the DNA from both brands?
Jun: We compare it to a love affair; we reinterpret each other.
Bram: To fall in love with two juices, you need roses, so the idea was to start with that. If you go more extreme or to get over it, you need something very loud and powerful. Take a powdery vanilla, and twist it heavily with cumin, very contradicting, but that completes a love story.
