On January 19, Brooklyn Peltz Beckham posted 821 words on Instagram Stories declaring war on his parents, his childhood, and the family machine that made him famous. He called the Beckham brand a “facade.” He said his family’s love was conditional on “how much you post on social media.” He said he did not want to reconcile. He said he was finally standing up for himself.
Three weeks later, he was photographed in Los Angeles with fresh laser scars on his arm where a tattoo reading “DAD” used to be.
Brooklyn Beckham wants out. That much is obvious to anyone paying attention. But here’s what nobody seems to have noticed: every single thing he’s built on the way out the door is made from the same materials as the house he’s leaving.
He Changed His Name — But Kept the Part That Matters
Image credit: @brooklynpeltzbeckham
When Brooklyn married Nicola Peltz in April 2022, he changed his legal name to Brooklyn Joseph Peltz Beckham. At the time, it was framed as sweet. Progressive. A modern husband honoring his bride. He told reporters he just thought it “fit really cool together.”
But he didn’t drop Beckham. He added to it. He’s not Brooklyn Peltz. He’s Brooklyn Peltz Beckham. The very name he says represents a “facade” of forced family harmony is still right there, anchoring the end of every byline, every Instagram handle, every endorsement deal.
Even his professional initials — BPB, the ones he uses to sign deals and sidestep his mother’s trademark — end with a B. And that B isn’t for Brooklyn.
He Built an Independent Brand — and Named It After His Dad
Cloud23, Brooklyn’s hot sauce brand, launched in late 2024 and landed a national Whole Foods partnership — a genuine accomplishment by any measure. He designed the bottle himself. He developed the recipes. He deliberately kept his name off the label. “My name isn’t anywhere on the bottle,” he told a Brandweek audience, framing it as a decision to let the product stand on its own.
But Cloud23 isn’t a random name. The “23” is David Beckham’s jersey number at Real Madrid and LA Galaxy. Brooklyn has said this openly. He named his independence project after the most iconic number associated with his father’s career.
It doesn’t stop there. The legal entity behind Cloud23 is a company called Buster Hot Sauce Inc. “Buster” is the nickname David Beckham gave Brooklyn as a child. David has it tattooed on his neck. Brooklyn’s own arm still reads “Love you Bust” beneath the spot where “DAD” has been lasered off.
So the hot sauce company designed to prove Brooklyn can make it on his own is named after his father’s jersey number and incorporated under his father’s pet name for him. He built a monument to independence on a foundation of inherited sentimentality.
He’s Erasing His Parents From His Skin. Slowly. Selectively.
Image credit: @brooklynbeckham/X
Brooklyn Beckham has over 100 tattoos. At least 70 of them are dedicated to his wife Nicola. But it’s the subtractions that tell the more interesting story.
In mid-2025 — months before going public with any grievance — photographs from a Glamour Germany shoot revealed that the “mama’s boy” script on his chest had been all but swallowed by a new floral design modeled after Nicola’s wedding bouquet. A tribute to his mother, physically overwritten by a tribute to his wife.
He altered a heart-shaped “mum” tattoo on his shoulder, layering new imagery — flowers, and what appears to be either a snake or a dragon — over where the word used to sit.
Then, in February 2026, photos surfaced showing active laser removal on the “DAD” anchor tattoo on his right arm. A source told The Sun he “wanted it gone.” The word has been replaced with nondescript shapes — life preservers and a starfish, of all things.
But beneath the anchor, the words “Love you Bust” remain. Faded, according to reports, but still there. The declaration of love is gone. The childhood nickname stays. He can’t bring himself to remove the part that sounds like a private joke between a father and a little boy, even as he erases the part that says “father” out loud.
He Rejects the Brand — Then Borrows It.
Image credit: @brooklynpeltzbeckham
Perhaps the most revealing detail in this entire saga is the name of Brooklyn’s planned food venture: Becks Buns.
“Becks.” The nickname that defined his father for three decades. The tabloid shorthand for the most famous athlete-turned-brand in British history. “Posh and Becks” was the couple’s joint trademark on pop culture itself. Brooklyn knows this. Everyone knows this. David reportedly told friends it felt like Brooklyn was “deliberately taking the p***.”
And yet Brooklyn filed the trademark anyway, through Buster Hot Sauce Inc. — the company already named after his dad’s nickname for him, expanding into a food brand named after his dad’s nickname for himself.
When Beck’s beer (the actual German brewery) challenged the trademark filing, it added an almost comic layer to the story: Brooklyn Beckham can’t use his own name commercially because his mother owns it, and now he can’t use his father’s nickname commercially because a German beer company owns it. The man is surrounded on all sides by other people’s intellectual property.
The Contradiction He Can’t Resolve
Image credit: @brooklynpeltzbeckham
Here’s what makes Brooklyn Beckham’s story genuinely fascinating — not as gossip, not as a legal case study, but as a human one.
He isn’t faking the pain. The estrangement reads as real. The anxiety he describes, the sense of having been managed and curated since before he could consent, the feeling that family love was transactional — none of that requires exaggeration to be believed. He was in a paid magazine photoshoot at five weeks old. His name was trademarked when he was seventeen. He was a brand asset before he was a legal adult.
But he’s also not free of it. Not even close. And the evidence isn’t in what he says — it’s in what he builds.
He names his company after his dad’s nickname for him. He names his product after his dad’s jersey number. He names his food brand after his dad’s tabloid moniker. He keeps the childhood pet name inked on his arm while lasering off the word “dad” that sits right above it.
Every act of rebellion is threaded with inheritance. Every declaration of independence is underwritten by the brand he says he’s rejecting. He is trying to leave home, and he keeps packing souvenirs on the way out — not because he’s a hypocrite, but because that’s what it actually looks like when the thing you’re running from is also the thing that built you.
Brooklyn Beckham didn’t choose to be born into a brand. But he can’t seem to build outside of one either. And that tension — between wanting to be your own person and being unable to construct that person without borrowing from the people you blame — might be the most honest thing about this entire mess.
Nobody’s writing that story because it doesn’t have a clean villain or a satisfying ending. It’s not a mastermind executing a plan. It’s not a spoiled brat throwing a tantrum. It’s a 26-year-old man standing in the middle of an identity crisis, laser burns on one arm and his father’s nickname on the other, trying to figure out where Brand Beckham ends and Brooklyn begins.
He hasn’t figured it out yet. And honestly, he might never.