There is a faint new icon swimming in your summer: sardines.
Apparel and products featuring Petit Fish are currently available on the Internet. Known for its long, slender body and bulging eyes, sardines are a cute expression of the online world of Mediterranean lifestyle. According to Google Trends, search interest for Finned Fashions has risen 300% since 2004, reaching a record high in May 2025 as “Sardine Dress” doubled over the past month, according to Google Trends. Famously sold for its bright and decorative cans, the salty snacks hang from our ears, across our hair, bed, and breasts.
“Everything in the past month has become all sardines!” Another Tiktok user said of our present moment.
This trend is similar to previous summer obsessions with tomatoes and strawberries. On the surface, sardines are a cheeky aesthetically pleasing aesthetic aesthetic that is ideal for summer dresses and dining tables (we don’t look for the distance of this titktok user’s sardine style TJ Max). It’s summer! Who doesn’t want to blow up Addison Rae’s “Aquamarine” and have some fishy fun?
But we swim deeper and we also see that sardines might now say something about society. and It’s fun.
“Sardines are very humble fish,” says Guido Bonsaver, professor of Italian cultural history at Oxford University in the UK. Healthy and cheap snacks don’t talk much about the spirit of luxury. While only a few small fish can be a satisfying meal, colorful cans give you an unadorned “artistic refinement,” he said. Finding happiness as everyday people in our economic and political context is something we are striving for now, Bonsever said.
Sardines as “recession indicators”? You bet.
Sardine Core evokes the need to embrace and be satisfied with a cheaper lifestyle. Don’t take that as a failure. “The sardines symbolize that. They are very small fish (sold) very cheap cans. But they can make great dishes.”
Balance searches are particularly apparent as “recession indicator” content propagates through Tiktok. Gen Z enjoys the idea of cultural age items as predictors of the US economy.
Some ticktalkers argue that sardine core shoppers should actually be forced to taste sardines, but whether you eat, wear or post small fish is your own invitation to make a small amount of life feel a bit grander.
And if you’re interested in the “Sardine Girl Summer” idea and it’s not that deep for you, that’s fine too. Keep swimming.
