Tom of Finland’s body of erotica has titillated queer audiences for generations. At The Standard, High Line, downtown types and leather daddies mixed it up for an evening to celebrate Tom of Finland: Highway Patrol, Greasy Rider, and Other Selected Works at the David Kordansky Gallery. Our friends from the Tom of Finland Foundation joined Susanne Bartsch—first for a dinner in The Standard Grill, followed by an afterparty in the Boom Boom Room.
Polaroids and cock rings (encircling napkins at each table setting) set the tone in The Grill, where guests toasted the new exhibition over cocktails and Chef Paul Hargrove’s chophouse favorites. Later on, the crowd moved upstairs for a kinky good time with beats and views of the city. The guest list included nightlife icons like Amanda Lepore, drag stars like Dahlia Sin and more style-setters from Bartschland and beyond: Carly Mark, Silvia Prada, Casey Spooner, Kendall Werts, Miles Greenberg, Olga Ferrara, Michael Anthony Bucaram, Brooke Wise and Griffin Maxwell Brooks.
Take a peek at the scene at The Standard, High Line—where for one night only, The Boom Boom Room felt like a leather bar in the sky.
"[Tom of Finland] gave them an opportunity to have an identity that they didn’t see was available before. So they used that, and grew into that, and became that, and felt free, positive, self-confident, and not ashamed." — Durk Dehner, co-founder of The Tom of Finland Foundation, to Interview Magazine
