Tom of Finland – complex and unusual and beautiful

Photo: perfumeniche

To be successful in the fragrance business, your brand has to stand out, and French niche line Etat Libre d’Orange sure stands out. In an industry that thrives on appealing to romantic notions of scent, the Etat Libre d’Orange brand is bawdy, raunchy and droll, with blurred lines when it comes to gender designations.

Their mandate, which they call their “Declaration of Independence”, states:

At Etat Libre d’Orange, perfumers are given complete creative freedom to play with their own personal fantasies and develop original, provocative scents. In this way, we return to the ideals of perfume – its carnal energy, sensual power, and the essential, erotic expression of the body and its desire.

This credo is expressed in all aspects of the brand, from promotion and packaging to the décor of their stores.

It makes perfect sense that the house producing fragrances like Secretions Magnifiques, Delicious Closet Queen, and Je Suis un Homme would be chosen by the Tom of Finland Foundation to create a scent honouring Finnish artist Touko Laaksonen, also known as Tom of Finland. Laaksonen’s stylized homoerotic fetish drawings of muscular sailors, bikers, lumberjacks, and construction workers profoundly influenced gay culture in the late 20th century and have earned a place in the permanent collection of New York's Museum of Modern Art.

I remember picking up a bottle of Tom of Finland at the Etat Libre d’Orange store in Paris. The outside of the box has a matte, rubbery feel, accompanied by a warning of sexually explicit content inside.

I wasn’t sure what to expect from a fragrance inspired by the man whose drawings depict hypersexual, half-dressed, leather-clad men enjoying themselves. Still, I wasn’t expecting such a wearable, beautiful, unisex scent.

Tom of Finland opens with aldehydes and lemon that create a gorgeous rubber accord. This is not the hot, smoky rubber smell of Bulgari Black, this is a clean and enticing smell of rubber. It gets green as it blooms from birch leaves, pine, galbanum and cypress. For a while, it smells like a fresh forest to me. It soon becomes leathery, spicy, warm, and woody due to safraleine, while pepper adds more warmth and spiciness. Safraleine also features a rose facet, which is enhanced by geranium, lending the fragrance a floral aspect that rounds it out perfectly. At times, I get a whiff of plastic that isn’t jarring or odd because it belongs.  At the base, vanilla and tonka bean give it a cozy sweetness, while iris and vetiver add an earthy undertone. But the part I love is the salty-skin note warmed by musk and smoothed by a soft, sensuous note if suede.

On me, the drydown is clean, green, salty and just a little sweet. It’s complex, unusual, and beautiful, and not at all animalic, edgy, or raunchy. It respects the life of the man who was Tom of Finland and is a perfect olfactory homage to an artist whose work had a lasting impact and made a difference.

Check out Tom of Finland in our Shop.