From the outside, No. 1421 Laveta Terrace, looks just like any other property in Echo Park, a leafy, residential area of Los Angeles.
However, this is the house where Finnish artist Touko Laaksonen, best known as Tom of Finland, lived and worked during the last decade of his life. Known officially as Tom House, is now home to the Tom of Finland Foundation and serves as a living tribute to the artist’s radical vision of unapologetic homoerotic sexuality.
Described as ‘part shrine, part haven, part art-historical archive, and part utopian collective,’ it’s now been immortalized in Tom House: Tom Of Finland In Los Angeles, a new hardcover imprint from Rizzoli.
The vision of creative director Michael Reynolds, the book combines interior photographs of art-filled rooms, from the dining room to the dungeon, by photographer Martyn Thompson with words from essayist, journalist and design authority Mayer Rus and unpublished preparatory sketches and drawings by Tom himself.
The result is an experience that celebrates Tom’s work and life in an entirely new light, inviting readers into Touko Laaksonen’s hidden world of dreams and desire – the world of Tom of Finland. Tom House: Tom Of Finland In Los Angeles is available from Amazon and costs £26.