Five of the best Freunde von Freunden interviews

There’s a reason why girls like me used to babysit, and it sure wasn’t for the £2-per-hour wage and free Cheese strings. SNOOPING, dear friends, is one of the most seductively naughty and curious pastimes of the world. Walking past a home with all the lights on at night gives me the same sensation as finding a fiver on the floor and here’s why – how others decorate and personalise their places of dwelling is infinitely interesting, and the chance to cast your own judgment on their choices is addictive.

Snooping or breaking into people’s homes is frowned upon, but luckily we have Berlin-based Freunde von Freunden -“An international interview magazine that portrays people of diverse creative and cultural backgrounds in their homes and within their daily working environments.” Basically they visit artists and creatives all over the world with cameras and do the snooping so we don’t have to. We are huge fans of Freunde von Freunden (which translates as “Friends of Friends”) so we decided to choose our top five interviews for you today. Enjoy!

Artist Gisèle d’Ailly van Waterschoot van der Gracht

Gisèle d’Ailly van Waterschoot van der Gracht is a wonderful artist living in Amsterdam. Her house is the stuff of dreams: part eclectic studio full of knick-knacks (knick-knacks are heavily applauded on Freunde von Freunden) and antiques. Having a studio like this would genuinely make you want to live as long as physically possible, which perhaps explains why she lived to be over 100-years-old!

www.freundevonfreunden.com/gisele-dailly-van-waterschoot-van-der-gracht

Creative Director of American Apparel, Iris Alonzo

Personally this is the FvonF interview I keep coming back to – Iris’ apartment taught me that even though your parents say that hoarding crap is a bad thing, if your apartment is nice enough you can pretty much get away with anything. Iris’ jaw-dropping home is full of trinkets she’s picked up all over the world on her travels, and she’s obviously got a great eye for curious items. Probably why American Apparel made her Creative Director of their whole company – nice move guys. Here’s a great interview with Iris heartily defending a recent controversial American Apparel advert.

www.freundevonfreunden.com/iris-alonzo

Tim Noble & Sue Webster

A lot of the interviews and shoots on FvonF are pretty twee – nice people having cups of tea surrounded by houseplants and hanging crystals etc. – which is why this peek into Tim Noble and Sue Webster’s lair is like a bolt hole for the more rebellious viewer. From their “Welcome Motherfuckers” doormat to the effortlessly cool photo-collage on the wall of all their arty friends from the 1990s, this studio is their work personified. Not to mention from the exterior it looks like some sort of Siberian storm shelter (but in Shoreditch).

Nathan Cowen & Jacob Klein (Haw-Lin)

We love Haw-Lin, and it’s so nice to put faces to the fantastic work they do. Rumour has it that Nathan and Jacob weren’t too pleased with this Freunde von Freunden peek into their lives as it made it look as if they lived together as lovers – which they do not. Regardless, it’s fantastic to see the two of them plodding around Berlin and lounging in kitchens and stroking dogs on the street. Considering that the Haw-Lin blog is a shrine to impeccable design, I particularly enjoy the photo of the two of them fawning over the design of a chair.

www.freundevonfreunden.com/haw-lin

Galerist Johann König

As friendly as Johann probably is, this is the kind of apartment you would never have a hope of visiting unless you were part of the fine art photography glitterati. Freunde von Freunden take us by the hand into the apartment/studio of the legendary galerist Johann König where we hang out with Juergen Teller and drool over the spectacular things he’s chosen to hang on his wall. These shots de-mystify one of the men in the art world you always hear about but never really see, and that’s why FvonF is so useful. There’s something so humbling about seeing a famous man’s washing machine, don’t you think?

www.freundevonfreunden.com/johann-koenig