IN MY ROOM

Eleanor Friedberger, photographed for

Spin in Brooklyn, New York, August ⁹, ²⁰⁰⁷

E leanor
F riedberger
The Fiery Furnaces’ singer tells
us about the favorite objects in her
cozy Brooklyn apartment

1SHEEPDOG CLOCK “I was walking down a street in San Francisco with my boyfriend [Franz Ferdinand’s Alex Kapranos], and we saw this in the window. I just screamed: They had about 50 dog-head clocks made out of papier-mâché. Three weeks later, this one showed up at my door. He’d gone back for it!”

2CROSS-COUNTRY SKIS “When we were recording Widow City in Benton Harbor, Michigan, it snowed three of the four weeks we were there. We couldn’t drive anywhere. I was going stir-crazy, so I bought these skis at a thrift store to get some exercise.”

3BAND CARICATURE “We get a lot of fan art. This was given to me after a show in Boston. It’s a really funny depiction of us—we’re in a boat, plus there’s an octopus, a dinosaur, and a wolf. The gifts we get are really creative and well executed.”

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4JOHN AND YOKO PHOTO “This is an actual print that someone found in a junk store and gave to me. It’s not a very good picture. I think it’s just bizarre—they don’t look particularly happy or sad. Just matter-of-fact.”

5GOD’S EYE “When I’m in Scotland with my boyfriend, I get inspired to do crafts. I don’t have a good story for this, except that the sticks are from Dumfries and Galloway County in Scotland, and the wool is from the Red Cross.”

6PAINT-BY-NUMBERS DOG PORTRAIT “I pick these up all over. I have four of them in my bedroom. It’s just funny to have something that someone spent so much time on but then discarded so easily.”

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7ICELANDIC TROPHY “This trophy commemorates a feminist holiday in Iceland when the women all walk out of their jobs to protest inequality. I bought it at a garage sale in Reykjavík. It shows someone skiing, and it says, in Icelandic, ‘At 40, you can do anything!’ That’s the slogan I’m gonna live by.”

8THE FIERY FURNACE, BY LAWRENCE WILLIAMS “Our band name comes from a line in the movie Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, but I found this novel in Australia with the same name—it’s just a coincidence. The front cover says that it’s about a ‘charming pyromaniac.’ I’ve started it. It’s really bad.”

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9TYPEWRITER CASE “I write all of my [assumes a pretentious voice] works of art on a typewriter. All of my songwriting. All of my poetry. I don’t use the Mac laptop on my desk, no. Just the typewriter.” She’s kidding.

10HANDMADE STUFFED OWL “That’s something I made. That’s my little friend. Um, no, I don’t sleep with it….I’m too old for that....”

BY MICHAEL ENDELMAN / PHOTOGRAPH BY TINA TYRELL