Acqua di Parma CEO Giulio Bergamaschi on Navigating the Future of Fragrance

Italian fragrance house Acqua di Parma has gone 110 years without relying on a celebrity ambassador to sell its products. Until now. The LVMH-owned brand has tapped Michael Fassbender as its first face, but don’t call him a “celebrity ambassador”, says Giulio Bergamaschi, Acqua di Parma’s CEO. “For me, Michael is beyond a remarkable acting talent,” he says. “He is a choice of substance that will nurture our equity and foundation rather than a viral choice. Of course, we expect that he will bring new attention to the brand and a cultural credibility that makes our message more precise, universal and authentic.” To celebrate the occasion, the brand has launched a limited-edition fragrance, Colonia Profumo Millesimato. It’s the star of the fragrance house’s The Art of Living Italian campaign, alongside the 48-year-old German Irish actor and Sabrina Impacciatore, the breakout Italian actress from The White Lotus and most recently The Paper. The campaign was shot in Parma, a historic Italian town, where the brand was founded. Bergamaschi is firm that the brand is not diverting from its strategy of sprezzatura, the art of discrete elegance; instead, rejoicing in a moment of expression. “We simply expect to strengthen our values in an original way. Acqua di Parma has never chased the hype and we don’t behave in certain ways to please certain trends. We’re a maison built on timelessness and discernment,” he says. The brand’s priorities remain aligned to four key pillars: quality, craftsmanship, human dimension and Italianity. Acqua di Parma also has a rich history that’s propelled itself to the top of the fragrance market, including via its signature sunshine yellow color palette, the coat of arms from Marie Louise, Duchess of Parma, who was Napoleon’s second wife, its Art Deco-shaped bottles and the hatbox packaging. The luxury fragrance market has been finding relief during a global luxury slowdown. In LVMH’s Q3 earnings, sales for perfumes and cosmetics were up 2%. “The brand is in good health,” says Bergamaschi. But looking ahead, he thinks the luxury consumer is shifting their buying habits after a spike in sales for fragrances under the TikTok phenomenon of woody scents like Maison Francis Kurkdjian’s Baccarat Rouge 540 or Vilhelm Parfumerie’s Faces of Frances. Consumers are starting to think twice before spritzing themselves. “Luxury clients these days are a bit more reluctant to hype and are demanding on quality. In the world of niche fragrance, clients are understanding that loud performance doesn’t always mean superactive quality. There is a new generation of clients understanding that quality lies in the ingredients and its extractions,” says Bergamaschi, placing emphasis on the brand’s olfactory techniques through in-store experiences and customer service, as well as collaborations with the likes of Italian luxury car manufacturer Maserati, French restaurant Le Petit Maison and British designer Samuel Ross. In 1916, Acqua di Parma’s founder Baron Carlo Magnani created Colonia, a light fragrance doused with notes of lemon, lavender, rose, rosemary and patchouli, as a contrast to the powdery and floral French perfumes on the market at the time. That same scent remains a bestseller today, and has extended into a standalone collection of different variations, from musky and woody to fresh citrus. Another top performer is the Blu Mediterraneo collection, inspired by the charm of the Italian Mediterranean and named after Amalfi, Capri, Sicily and Panarea. “What we’re seeing from our clients, especially from younger demographics, is that they are playing around with the idea of layering their fragrances,” says Bergamaschi. In the last six years, the brand has acquired new audiences by way of Asia, the Middle East and North America, as consumers experimented across brands and fragrances during Covid. Sales are driven regularly by a younger clientele, and there’s a balanced mix of genders interacting with the fragrances, which are two missions that Acqua di Parma has been steadily working toward by positioning itself as a gender-neutral fragrance brand in newer markets. In Europe, the brand is widely associated with masculinity, but Bergamaschi clarifies that its total demographic divide is 50-50. The big operation at hand is to bring Italy to other regions without becoming gimmicky. Bergamaschi has turned to hospitality, a universal language for Italians that can be easily translated anywhere. In 2022, Acqua di Parma opened its café pop-up in Milan, followed by its Yellow Café in Seoul in June 2025, and another temporary opening from September to November 2025 inside Bloomingdale’s at Dubai Mall, which was a café experience with Italian coffee in yellow and white ceramic cups, while each table was decorated with the brand’s candles and diffusers. Brands have been tapping into café culture to appeal to a Middle Eastern consumer that predominantly doesn’t drink alcohol, as well as a new generation of millennials and Gen Zs who have swapped martinis for matcha. In time, these pop-ups have become Instagram hotspots and destinations where consumers spend money to engage with the respective brands organically. The Acqua di Parma Caffettino will be traveling throughout the year to mark the brand’s 110th anniversary. “[These pop-ups create] a natural buzz, we’re not a brand that relies heavily on social media,” says Bergamaschi. Even though the brand doesn’t host elaborate events with content creators, on TikTok, it still partners with select names to promote its fragrances. Bergarmasci joined Acqua di Parma in March 2023 from Loro Piana, where he spent a year as strategic missions director. He was previously at L’Oréal Group for 18 years, holding positions in Italy, France and China. “Through L’Oréal, I learned everything about the beauty market, and it’s where I discovered Asia. At Loro Piana, even though it was short, it taught me so much about what it means to obsess over quality and the endless quest for excellence,” he says. Even though it’s a year of celebrations, Bergamaschi is intent that Acqua di Parma stick to staying under the radar and true to its Italian roots without any compromises.