READING MATERIAL: It’s no surprise that Sophie Auster, the daughter of two novelists, has a bedroom full of books. (Chad Rachman/New York Post)
‘Living with a roommate was a good experience, but I really wanted to live alone after that,” Sophie Auster, 24, says from the living room of her one-bedroom apartment in the Hudson Square area.
She moved into the 880-square-foot loft-like condo — north of TriBeCa near the Holland Tunnel — three years ago while she was at Sarah Lawrence College.
“My senior year, when I finally was finishing up, I was living here and commuting to Bronxville, which was really interesting,” she says. “I had a 9 a.m. art class ’cause you need a visual arts to graduate, and I needed some credits, and I hadn’t taken one. So I had this 9 a.m. painting class and I had to wake up at like 6 a.m. twice a week just to make the train and get there on time.”
With 11-foot ceilings, Brazilian wenge wood floors and a kitchen with custom concrete counters and stainless-steel appliances, her apartment is definitely a cut above dorm life or typical post-grad habitation.
“The apartment came about because my parents [authors Paul Auster and Siri Hustvedt] were — right when the market went down — going to buy an apartment in Paris. And then, they thought, well, if we’re going to invest money in some place, we might as well invest it in a place for our child to live while she is trying to do what she wants to do.”
What she’s doing is making music. Auster cites many influences, including Tom Waits, the Beatles, Radiohead and Fiona Apple, but her sound is closest to Apple’s moody alt-rock. She recorded her first album when she was just 16, setting her father’s English translations of French surrealist poets to original music, and is at work on a second album, scheduled to be released in the fall.
“I grew up reading a lot of poetry. So the poets that I respect, I think that their work has kind of influenced my writing, you know, the lyrical content,” Auster says. “I started reading Emily Dickinson before I could understand anything that she was saying. I still don’t understand what she’s saying half the time. But, you know, I do my best.”
Shelves built by her architect aunt fill a living-room wall with books Auster’s reading and others she’s been meaning to get to, like a collection of Samuel Beckett’s writing.
Auster grew up in a sprawling brownstone in Park Slope, where her parents still live.
“I always joke because I feel like all my friends moved to Brooklyn when I moved out,” she says. “I don’t know, I grew up there my whole life. For me, I loved growing up in Brooklyn, but I always wanted to live in Manhattan, and now I do. I find it’s nice because I just feel close to everything.”
While she wishes they’d put a bodega in her building instead of the current lighting store, there are plenty of dining options nearby: “Estancia across the street is really nice. It’s just kind of a very low-key kind of place.”
She also likes eating at Odeon and Locanda Verde in TriBeCa. One of her favorite hangouts — the Smith and Mills bar — is also in TriBeCa: “It’s in an old carriage house that held horses, so it’s really small, but it’s a cool dive. Really good drinks.”
Auster loves cooking at home for friends as well. “Cooking and talking and drinking, and everyone just ends up sitting over there,” she says of how her friends cluster in the kitchen.
Other places to sit: around the large wooden dining table and on a small stylish couch and two chairs. The minimalist decor gives the place a sleek look while a surrealist painting that used to hang in her father’s study reminds her of home. An abstract portrait painted by her uncle, artist Jon Kessler, hangs on an adjacent wall: “It’s funny because people say it looks either like my cousin or Mick Jagger.”
Auster still sees plenty of her family. Her mom calls her in the middle of our visit to confirm dinner plans for that evening.
“My mom came to my show [an album preview at Rockwood Music Hall] last night, which was nice,” Auster says proudly.
Auster has been working on her music at home, where the apartment’s high ceilings serve a dual purpose.
“I like how high the ceilings are because if they weren’t, I think it’d feel kind of cramped,” she says.
A microphone set up between the living and dining areas, a gift from her ex-boyfriend, comes in handy for makeshift home recordings — and the ceilings make for good acoustics: “It feels like you’re singing in a giant bathroom and gives it some reverb.”
Auster’s content being single and focusing on her music for now: “Everyone’s pregnant in this neighborhood. I’m the only single person in the building. I’ve moved from one stroller neighborhood to another. Maybe I’m just trying to move back home.”
Sophie Auster’s
FAVORITE THINGS
* The light that comes in through the big windows
* The high ceilings
* Her closet space
* The bookshelves her aunt made
* Family photographs
* The dining table
* The open kitchen