After years of neutral cashmere sweaters from the Row and black-on-black Loro Piana baseball caps, the pendulum has swung away from “quiet luxury” and in the opposite direction. Eventually, someone had to say the quiet part out loud, and so—as if summoned by the algorithm itself—here is Becca Bloom.
At the start of this year, Bloom had never posted to TikTok. But over the past few weeks, @beccaxbloom has amassed more than two million followers, becoming the crown jewel in a growing subgenre that the Internet has come to know as #RichTok.
This corner of the app offers curated glimpses into the lives of the .01 percent, often through displays of everyday extravagance, with hallmarks such as Rolex watches and Hermès bags. The hashtag has accrued upward of 82,000 videos, ranging from first-class travel vlogs to lists of things rich people supposedly don’t do, such as wear prominent logos, buy lottery tickets, and keep money in savings accounts.
Ever since there’s been conspicuous wealth, there have been people eager to gawk at it, from the extravagant triumphal processions of the Roman emperors to Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous in the 1980s and Rich Kids of Instagram in the 2010s. This time around, however, what’s on view is more personal, less achievement-based, and more about aesthetics. One comes to #RichTok not to feel successful but to feel soothed—to bask in a lifestyle so frictionless it barely requires motion.
There are several notable #RichTok variants, such as Dark Academia, an aesthetic that romanticizes tweed blazers and leather-bound libraries, and Old Money Aesthetic—tennis whites and framed oil paintings of horses—although both are less about having actual riches than dressing up in the trappings of wealth. But Bloom isn’t pretending; she’s embodying what the Internet has deemed “rich people who rich right.”
The most watched video in the Bloom cinematic universe is of her preparing breakfast. It has been viewed close to 30 million times and begins, “Plate my breakfast with me.” She retrieves a pair of chopsticks from a large, silver-plated Christofle egg and assembles dim sum, shrimp dumplings, baby corn, and hard-boiled eggs. “Our chef usually likes to do a combination of Eastern and Western cuisines,” she says before unloading two heaping spoonfuls of caviar on top, “for seasoning purposes.” (Almost as popular are the videos of Bloom plating her cat’s and dog’s breakfasts, also prepared by her chef.)
Another video offers viewers the chance to go jewelry shopping with her at Van Cleef & Arpels. It ends with a haul that could fund a small liberal-arts college: “We ended up purchasing the all-diamond Butterfly ring ($30,200), the all-diamond Butterfly matching necklace ($16,800), as well as the Snowflake pendant necklace ($47,000), which is part of their High Jewelry collection,” she says matter-of-factly. “I also replaced the vintage carnelian Alhambra bracelet ($5,050) that I lost last year.”
Though she has kept details about herself to a minimum, the Internet has unmasked Bloom as Rebecca Ma, a 25-year-old University of Southern California graduate from Atherton, California. In a 2020 YouTube interview, she described how her parents “started from nothing” but eventually built a business of 5,000 employees focused on software and cloud computing in China, from which her wealth accrues. She states in her TikToks that she works in finance.
She is engaged to be married to David Pownall, a software engineer at Google. The wedding is planned for the Villa Balbiano, overlooking Lake Como, this summer—an opulent 17th-century estate often rented for fashion campaigns. The setting suggests a full-scale production, and all signs point to Bloom documenting every detail, down to the last diamond boutonniere.
Bloom is hardly alone. Creators such as Chloe Liem (1.1 million followers) and Mei Leung (500,000 followers) post seemingly identical signifiers of wealth: trips on private jets, shopping sprees at Van Cleef & Arpels, and relationships with Hermès sales associates, who are treated with the kind of reverence usually reserved for minor deities. (In a recent twist, some followers have begun questioning whether Mei Leung is as wealthy as she claims—a cardinal sin on #RichTok.)
But something about Bloom feels different. She is physically striking without looking like a model; she is put together without being intimidating. Her voice is soft but assured, sweet but not saccharine. Fans praise the fact that she has a full-time job and that she delivers pieces of advice that seem emotionally intelligent. Spending “hauls” are interspersed with musings on dating and mindset.
Mid-pandemic this might have registered as tone-deaf, but the appeal of #RichTok is not just the having of wealth but the spending of it in very specific ways. In Bloom’s case, it is done in a way that feels friendly, nonchalant, and nonthreatening. She doesn’t brag—she narrates. She never tells you how to get what she has. She simply shows you what it looks like once you do.
There is no ideology here, no instruction manual, no “secrets to success.” Bloom is what happens when luxury rebrands itself, not as exclusivity or power but as softness, serenity, and a complete disassociation from the economic realities of everyone else.
#RichTok doesn’t concern itself with how the wealth was acquired—only with how elegantly it can be displayed. That’s why Becca feels new. She’s not pretending to be relatable. She’s not even claiming to deserve it. She’s just letting you watch.
Chloe Russell Kent is a journalist and documentarian. She can be found on Instagram and TikTok and is known for her original series, 80s Excess and Paper Trail
