Taylor Okata and Ben Perreira of Passionfruit are working to reimagine how high fashion brands interact with the islands.
Images by Brandyn Liu and courtesy of Passionfruit
“I’m wearing my ‘don’t look at me’ outfit,” laughs the stylist and consultant Ben Perreira. In a cavernous SoHo office, Perreira admits this after his business partner Taylor Okata, a fellow stylist and creative director, exclaims, “These are my errands clothes!” It’s a small thing, but how both dress is telling, revealing that when it comes to fashioning themselves and the world around them the two are always operating on the same wavelength. Although not dressed like twins per se, sartorial elements overlap: Perreira and Okata sport slouchy crew neck T-shirts layered under oversized button-ups, styled with knee-length denim shorts and easy sneakers (checkered Vans for Perreira, sold out Bode for Nike for Okata), finished with a tangle of neck chains and charms from jeweler friends or Hawai‘i stores.
They look like low-key island boys with high-end taste — a quality they’ve cultivated for over a decade each since leaving Kona and Honolulu, Perreira and Okata’s respective hometowns. Over the years, their individual resumes have boasted styling projects for industry titans like Carine Roitfeld and Yohji Yamamoto, an impressive combined C.V. considering that fashion was never either’s official plan.
After graduating high school, Perreira and Okata, who are a few years apart in age, both wound up in Los Angeles separately for college, initially unaware of each other’s existence. Perreira originally studied psychology but after finding it boring decided to transfer to the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising to major in styling. Okata, meanwhile, double majored in communication studies and studio art at Loyola Marymount University, with stints studying abroad in Italy and Tokyo.
“Fashion kind of found me, and I just went along for the ride,” says Perreira. His first day at FIDM he was asked to intern on an Elle photoshoot. It was 2010, and with magazines consistently shooting celebrities based in Los Angeles, his new home proved fertile ground for a burgeoning career in fashion. “I was ambitious and young and could jump from photoshoot to photoshoot,” he says, and the jobs kept coming. After graduation, New York called. Perreira started working for Carine Roitfeld, the former editor in chief of Vogue Paris, as her photoshoots became internationally syndicated for Harper’s Bazaar France and, later, her totemic magazine CR Fashion Book.
Okata ended up in New York under harder circumstances. After moving to Asia in 2008 for a television career, his agents dropped him for being queer. His sister happened to be moving to New York, so he followed. “All I wanted to do was hide because I kind of had an identity crisis,” says Okata. He found his first job on Craigslist as an editorial assistant at photo agency Trunk Archive, now Great Bowery. Though his education and experience proved his merit, Okata says that “having good style and being interested in fashion,” ultimately set him apart.
For years, Perreira and Okata hustled and parallel pathed their way through the industry. In 2013, they eventually met in Paris through a mutual connection. Okata was with Yohji Yamamoto in Paris, working on everything from sales and styling to supporting the runway shows, and Perreira’s assistant styling work for fashion shows, magazine editorials, and advertisements took him to the city frequently.
“We met for pau hana drinks,” remembers Okata of their first encounter. Almost instantly, Perreira clocked him as a fellow islander “because of his accent.” “I probably got bumped and the pidgin came out,” confesses Okata. “I say irraz under my breath a lot because people don’t understand it.”
The two liked each other but their work was all consuming. They remained distant, like planets orbiting each other. In 2019, Okata styled the fashion editorial “Blue Paradise” for the online retailer Ssense with Maui-based photographer Brendan George Ko. Okata scouted three local models as its stars: Haʻa Keaulana, pro surfer and granddaughter of legendary surfer Buffalo Keaulana; Lindsey Higa, an in-demand Honolulu stylist; and Evan Mock, a skateboarder and model, then still pre-Gossip Girl and Calvin Klein billboard ad fame. Against a softly lit, color saturated Oʻahu beach, the trio posed in luxury ready-to-wear, from cherry red MM6 Maison Margiela trousers to a fuchsia cheetah-print Gucci scarf tied as a long sarong.
Passionfruit is selective, choosing projects where they can bring a more authentic perspective to every level of the production.
“People either see a fashion shoot with all white models in Hawai‘i or a very Roxy surf shoot,” Okata says of pairing local talent, specifically chosen to reflect the islands’ Indigenous and mixed-Asian ethnic groups, with high fashion designer clothes. The editorial struck a nerve for its fresh approach, including with Perreira, who had already been chatting with Okata about the overlapping circles they ran in, saying, “We should work together.”
It took two years, many conversations, a global pandemic that forced both to temporarily relocate to their homeland, and a fortuitous project for their professional partnership to finally come to fruition. They announced Passionfruit concurrently with their first production: Jacquemus’ Fall/Winter 2022 “Le Splash” fashion show.
The opportunity arose from Perreira’s years of cultivating European relationships in the industry. After Jacquemus shot an editorial in Hawai‘i with photographer Tom Kneller, the designer Simon Porte Jacquemus thought the islands would be fitting for his first show outside of Europe, telling Vogue that he was drawn to the “dreamy and inspiring landscapes with incredible mountains, beaches, and sea.” A business contact from the team knew Perreira, who recently styled a Nike campaign with influencer Bretman Rock, was from the islands and called him about producing it in Hawai‘i. Perreira answered, “The only way I’ll do it is if Taylor is free.”
Located on a small beach along Kualoa Point owned by Kualoa Ranch, the production was sparse with an azure runway spanning the length of Mōli‘i Gardens’ beach. The cast of 56 models, a mix of local and flown-in talent, walked in garments cut from neutral ecru, vibrant lime green, moody blue, sherbert orange, and bubblegum pink fabrics. Among the more interesting aspects of the production, though, was backstage, which was filled with a predominantly local crew, from producers and photographers to dressers and makeup artists.
The show on March 10, 2022 was a social media success — its first Instagram reel currently has 9.7 million views — and was received warmly, though not without criticism. “For some fashion followers, the choice to hold a destination show in a place connected with colonialism and tourism was a misstep,” wrote Vogue, especially coming off the heels of a deadly pandemic. (Partially for this reason, only a select number of guests from Asia, Australia, the United States, and other Pacific Islands were flown out to attend.) Adding, “But to many of the local guests in the audience, seeing a European designer arrive islandside was affirming,” given how many luxury brands litter Waikīkī’s thoroughfare yet don’t interact with the community beyond extracting tourists’ dollars and occupying valuable real estate.
Perreira and Okata announced Passionfruit concurrently with their first production, Jacquemus’ Fall/Winter 2022 “Le Splash” fashion show held on Oʻahu.
“We want to equity build,” says Perreira. As this pertains to their Hawai‘i-centric projects, instead of extracting from the islands, their projects are chosen with the goal to “make the pie bigger.” Passionfruit does this by not only bringing opportunities to the state, but by giving Hawaiʻi creatives a seat at the decision-making table and inviting local talent to help envision the productions instead of merely executing someone else’s concept. “Brands have been doing resort and cruise collections in other cities but it’s never been done in the way that we integrated local communities in collaboration with a foreign brand at a luxury level,” adds Okata. It’s all guided by their self-proclaimed “intention-based approach,” which focuses on integrating the Hawaiʻi community with outside brands and publications. Passionfruit serves as a bridge between their two worlds, Perreira explains, “helping people make livelihoods through our connections with clients from the mainland and Europe while also teaching those same clients the political and social nuances of Hawai‘i.”
The Jacquemus show embodied their intention-based ethos, allowing the creative studio to make better decisions at every level. “Be it from behind the scenes, like the local cuisine served, the photographers, and the dressers, to in front of the camera,” says Okata. “It really was making sure we could fill in local talent at every level, not just the most visible,” he adds, since that’s what many brands do when shooting in Hawai‘i.
Since “Le Splash,” Passionfruit helped pitch photographer Nani Welch Keliʻihoʻomalu for a Hawai‘i water crisis story with the environmental publication Atmos and styled a fashion spread featuring local models and a photographer in Hawai‘i with Valentino clothing for CR Fashion Book. After the Lahaina fires in 2023, they produced a “Maui on My Mind” fundraiser T-shirt in collaboration with outside brands like Jacquemus and local ones like Sig Zane. The project raised $32,670 for the Kāko‘o Maui Fund created by the Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement to provide aid to local communities impacted by the disaster. Most recently, in April 2024, they served as creative consultants on the debut campaign for Loulu Hawaiʻi, a skincare and wellness brand headquartered on O‘ahu.
Passionfruit’s portfolio is eclectic and, ultimately, still small. Perreira and Okata are selective about projects, choosing those where they can bring a more authentic perspective to every level of the production or that meet their environmental or social justice brand pillars. Both still primarily work on the continent for their paychecks because, as Perreira puts it, “We’re priced out of paradise too.”
As they reflect on their paths, there’s a hero’s journey arc to their stories (not that either would claim to be heroic): The protagonist leaves home, learns lessons, and returns transformed. While both are grateful for their experiences, they’re wistful that the opportunities they needed to grow happened outside of the islands. That’s something they’re hoping to change for others as well. “We’re trying to create those spaces, moments, and opportunities for people to experience the bigger world,” Perreira says, “and expose them to things where they don’t feel like they have to leave to appreciate what they have.”