LeatherWeek: Tom of Finland

San Francisco Leather Week is the world’s first cultural festival focused on the art, history, and culture of the worldwide Leather and LGBTQ+ communities. Kicking off with the 31st Annual Leather Walk and San Francisco Leather PrideFest hosted by SF Eagle Bar, Leatherfolk and their supporters will come together to connect, celebrate, and deepen their knowledge and appreciation of leather cultural. LeatherWeek features exhibitions from Tom of Finland Foundation and the GLBT Museum, classes from kink-masters at House of Kush, and parade of parties and socials hosted by SF Eagle Bar and Folsom Street Foundation.

Touko Laaksonen, a decorated officer, returns home after a harrowing and heroic experience serving his country in World War II, but life in Finland during peacetime proves equally distressing. He finds peace-time Helsinki to be a place of rampant homophobia where men are pressured to marry women and have children. Touko finds refuge in his liberating art, specializing in homoerotic drawings of muscular men, free of inhibitions. His work – made famous by his signature ‘Tom of Finland’ – became the emblem of a generation of men and fanned the flames of a gay revolution.