What’s behind ‘mob wife aesthetic’?
It’s not every day that Francis Ford Coppola deigns to weigh in on a TikTok trend.
But he made an exception for the “mob wife aesthetic” — a louche amalgamation of fur coats, leather and leopard prints that are being presented on the platform as a kind of mafiosa cosplay. In a recent Instagram post, Coppola, the director of “The Godfather,” compared the style to that of Connie Corleone, a character from the film portrayed by his sister, Talia Shire: “a sultry, delightful Italian princess.”
Hundreds of videos on the app show young women with no apparent marital relationship to organized crime trying on their own approximations of the look, which usually involve heavy jewelry and heavier eyeliner.
TikTok churns out a new reigning “aesthetic” every few months, and they vary widely in their real-world influence on off-screen dress.
The most basic version involves throwing a fur coat — real or faux — over an all-black outfit. But according to its proponents, the look is nothing without the attitude to go with it. Careful students of the mob wife oeuvre add red nails and lipstick, a high-volume hairdo and sunglasses big enough to function as a kind of windshield.
“It’s expressive, it’s bold, it’s unapologetic,” said Sarah Arcuri, 29, who lives in New Jersey and calls herself the “Mob Wife Aesthetic CEO” on TikTok. She has been dressing that way since high school, she
said, inspired by the flashily dressed women in her Italian American family as well as the reality shows “Mob Wives” and “The Real Housewives of New Jersey.”
Arcuri has been posting about the mob wife look since 2022, but interest in the trend did not surge until recently.
TikTokers are mostly reaching for examples of fictional mob wives (and girlfriends) like Carmela Soprano, Edie Falco’s character on the HBO series “The Sopranos.” Users on the app are lip-syncing to scenes of her arguments with Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini) and circulating images of Falco with French tips and big hair. Others point to her “Sopranos” co-star Drea de Matteo, playing Adriana La Cerva, and Lorraine Bracco’s character in “Goodfellas,” Karen Hill.
Arcuri and others see TikTok’s preoccupation with mob wives as a reaction to the minimalist perfection sometimes advanced on visual social media platforms. Last year there was a “clean girl aesthetic” (think beige pullovers, tidy updos) and
“stealth wealth,” which prioritized subtle signifiers of wealth.
Like the clean girl and stealth wealth aesthetics, the mob wife look focuses on conspicuous signifiers of wealth, but this time it’s of those usually associated with the nouveau riche. And specifically those whose wealth was earned outside the rule of law.
Arcuri said she disagreed with critics who say the trend glamorizes an association with organized crime. And for every influencer currently ordering a fur coat, other TikTok users are saying that these trends increasingly feel manufactured and meaningless. “There is a little bit of aesthetic fatigue on social media,” she added. “Every little microtrend is labeled.”
Each of those labels functions as an opportunity for influencers, brands and, yes, media outlets to hop on a trend and direct it to their own ends. Those seeking to get the mob wife look may have to pay for it: A box of “mystery” items of secondhand mob wife apparel is already for sale on Poshmark for nearly $200.