Bill de Blasio’s liberal policies aren’t the only thing on display as he moves onto the national stage as New York’s mayor-elect. His family’s hair is also front and center. For those just tuning in:

Wife Chirlane McCray’s long dreadlocks are often pulled into a smart, flowing ponytail. Son Dante’s famously large Afro stands triumphant. His daughter, Chiara, wears her loose, kinky locks framed with a band of roses.

For a rare instant in the nation’s electoral history, the African American hair politic is on full display.

The hair aesthetic of de Blasio’s family speaks to the political moment and the culture of New York, says Brooklyn-based writer and image activist Michaela Angela Davis, who calls Dante’s Afro his father’s “most interesting surrogate.”

It’s “the optics,” she says. “This family probably understands the diversity of New York in a way we haven’t seen before.”

The family could have made more conservative choices for its appearance at Tuesday night’s victory party. Dante, 16, could have cut down his Afro. Chiara, 18, could have nixed the crown of flowers. But the family is self-expressive, and that comes across.

Davis calls them “typically Park Slope,” describing the Brooklyn neighborhood known for its progressive politics, architectural history and multiculturalism.

“This one family has these three hairstyles,” Davis says. “They kind of help explain the bouquet of who we are.”

The family’s hair story has been a line in de Blasio’s campaign and is guaranteed to be imprinted onto American consciousness during the mayor’s term. New York’s stop-and-frisk policy, used heavily to detain black and Hispanic boys and men, was a pivotal issue in the Democratic primary, and his son’s Afro — which identifies him as black at a glance — marked the future mayor as a stakeholder in the debate. It made clear that in navigating the hair politics in his own house, de Blasio has an intimacy with black culture that most white politicians don’t.

That Jim Kelly-style towering silhouette got a great deal of play this summer in a well-received advertisement in which Dante vouched for his dad’s credibility. De Blasio began to rise in the polls soon afterward. John Del Cecato, a longtime Democratic strategist who refers to himself as “follicly challenged,” created the ad. He said in an e-mail Wednesday that “the image of such a well-coifed family” evokes youthfulness, “while also inspiring me about New York’s future.”

De Blasio’s campaign also referred to a summer interview Dante gave to DNAInfo.com.

“Honestly, for years my hair was really just for me. I didn’t think people would love it so much,” Dante told the Web site about his Afro, which he’s been growing since the third grade. It was, in part, inspired by Huey Freeman, the black nationalist main character in “The Boondocks” comic strip and TV show.

Political women understand the potential of hair not just as an expression of personal style, but a way to telegraph meaning. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s headbands, bobs and smart, no-
nonsense short cuts were all discussed during her tenure as first lady and a U.S. senator. “Pay attention to your hair because everyone else will,” she famously said. And in 2008, her campaign produced brochures showing her hair in all its incarnations through the years, which staffers passed out to beauty salons in an appeal to female voters.