By Kim Hastreiter. Foreword by Whitney Mallett, Jeffrey Deitch, Carlo McCormick. Photographs by Jeremy Liebman. Cover art by Jim Joe.
A joyful romp through the singular and eclectic material world of a true New York character
Kim Hastreiter, cofounder of the beloved Paper magazine, has spent the last 50 years amassing a vast and iconoclastic collection of stuff. This volume, aptly titled STUFF, chronicles an extraordinary slice of history and the people who defined it, using Hastreiter’s singular edit of art, fashion, design, photography, books and ephemera as a lens. In these pages you’ll meet Hastreiter’s amazing friends: at an all-night party in the basement of an East Village church with Keith Haring; a private art sale with Jeffrey Deitch in Phyllis Diller’s kitchen; or impromptu cocktails at Trader Vic’s with Salvador Dalí and Joey Arias. STUFF is more than a memoir; it’s a loopy, joyous, chaotic ride through the last half century of cultural chaos in the greatest city on earth. Whether you are an OG or a kid, a culture vulture, artist, design buff, fashion nerd, skater, collector, chef, cinephile, New Yorker, uptowner, downtowner, out-of-towner or something else entirely, STUFF will make you feel like you’re sitting with Kim in her garden high above Washington Square Park, her booming voice imploring you to pursue your life with compulsive enthusiasm. The book features an exclusive cover design by the elusive yet legendary artist Jim Joe, best known for designing the iconic album cover for Drake’s If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late. Kim Hastreiter is a New Jersey native and consummate New Yorker. She is a cultural anthropologist and the original multi-hyphenate. An editor, publisher, curator and big idea person, she is best known for cofounding the legendary Paper magazine together with David Hershkovits, which they sold in 2017.
This book was published in conjunction with Amazing Unlimited
ABOVE: Maira Kalman's portrait of Kim Hastreiter for 'The New Yorker.'
PRAISE AND REVIEWS
Michael Stipe
STUFF is a meteoric rush of wonder, sass, and cool—told in a torrent of sonic booms. I couldn’t put it down.
David Byrne
Kim is a one person social media. She will say “YOU have to meet THIS person!” and is almost always right. It’s a public service, no charge. Her stuff is remnants of a life well lived, but these wacky and wonderful things are also convenient conversation starters, even for someone like me who had been somewhat challenged in that area. All of them have stories. Art without pretense, but with lots of surprises. Like Kim, they’re connectors.
Whitney Mallet
STUFF is a totally new genre of book, carving out a radically new mode of storytelling. The 448 page tome serves as both testament and beacon, a record of collaboratively-engineered creative intelligence that can guide whoever is looking to continue in its lineage.
Maira Kalman
The most incredible combination of boundless energy, love and taste. If you need a reason to go on, stay close to Kim. She is a life force of the highest order.
Pedro Almodovar
Kim has a great eye for new talent and treats them from the get-go as the stars they will eventually turn into. On top of that, she’s the best hostess in the world and is the only person who can introduce you to David Byrne, Joey Arias, Michael Stipe, Alba Clemente, Todd Solondz, Debi Mazar, John Waters, Rubén Toledo or the exquisite Isabel Toledo in her kitchen. Her enthusiasm makes us feel like better artists than we are.
Ed Templeton
This book is a tour de force in style and creativity! There will no doubt be a room in the NY Public Library dedicated to this uniquely New York City collection.
Lisa Yuskavage
This is a guide book to individuality and how to live a fun, joyous life. It should be used as an outline for a new way to live in awe for the next generation. Take nothing for granted and take ownership of your uniqueness. Love what you love passionately and share everything. That’s Kim in a nutshell.
Jeffrey Deitch
Kim is more of an artist than a collector. The remarkable contents of Kim’s Fifth Avenue home, which you’ll find in this book, should be enshrined in a museum of cultural history.
James Murphy
Something profound doesn’t need to be overly serious. Kim is one of the most open and playful people i’ve ever met. She’s also one of the most dedicated, generous, and industrious people i know. This book is like her... overwhelming in range and scope, while deeply human in scale. Detailed and joyous to such a degree that it’s unmooring.
Agnes Gund
Kim’s 'STUFF' is the most lively and engaging book I’ve ever read. There is no end to her creativity. WOW.
The New Yorker
Ariel Levy
The queen of stuff.
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Just a little—and we mean infinitesimal—detail from Kim Hastreiter’s home office, inside her maximally kitted-out Fifth Avenue apartment, reproduced from her over-the-top visual memoir, STUFF: A New York Life of Cultural Chaos—in which mementos from dear friends like Phyllis Diller, seen here, rub shoulders with artworks, fashion, objects, trinkets, souvenirs, snapshots, archival materials and anything expressive of an idea by luminaries, players and makers from across the spectrum of all NYC cultural classes of the past fifty years. John Waters, Jim Walrod, Isabel and Ruben Toledo, Paige Powell, Carlo McCormick, Keith Haring, Tauba Auerbach, Stephen Sprouse, Duro Olowu, Jeffrey Deitch … she tries her best to namecheck her friends, collaborators and inspirations, but the book is only 448 pages, after all. “I am a fanatical collector and curator of ‘stuff,’ Hafstreiter writes. “Mostly stuff that I think is amazing, important, tells a good story or just grabs my heart. After decades of obsessive collecting and brutal editing, I eventually came to realize that the objects I chose to keep told the best stories of my pretty crazy life so far—reflecting the way I’ve seen my unique slice of history evolve. There’s a reason I describe this as ‘more than a memoir.’ Looking back, I now see that this big chaotic archive also shows the influence of the radical history, and important people, and subcultural markers I’ve witnessed and participated in over the past 50 years, living as part of a maverick creative community in the greatest city on earth.” She concludes with advice for the new generation: “Please don’t leave it up to a generation 50 years from now, or, God Forbid, AI (!) to reinterpret what you are witnessing. Document it! Write about it! Film it! Make art about it! Collect important stuff that tells stories! Because when you are sitting many decades from now watching the 25-year-olds make art, music, films and books about it, you can bet you’ll be shaking your head wishing you had.” continue to blog
FORMAT: Hbk, 8 x 10 in. / 448 pgs / 1436 color / 3 b&w. LIST PRICE: U.S. $75.00 LIST PRICE: CANADA $110 ISBN: 9788862088312 PUBLISHER: Damiani AVAILABLE: 4/1/2025 DISTRIBUTION: D.A.P. RETAILER DISC: TRADE PUBLISHING STATUS: Active AVAILABILITY: In stock TERRITORY: NA LA
Published by Damiani. By Kim Hastreiter. Foreword by Whitney Mallett, Jeffrey Deitch, Carlo McCormick. Photographs by Jeremy Liebman. Cover art by Jim Joe.
A joyful romp through the singular and eclectic material world of a true New York character
Kim Hastreiter, cofounder of the beloved Paper magazine, has spent the last 50 years amassing a vast and iconoclastic collection of stuff. This volume, aptly titled STUFF, chronicles an extraordinary slice of history and the people who defined it, using Hastreiter’s singular edit of art, fashion, design, photography, books and ephemera as a lens. In these pages you’ll meet Hastreiter’s amazing friends: at an all-night party in the basement of an East Village church with Keith Haring; a private art sale with Jeffrey Deitch in Phyllis Diller’s kitchen; or impromptu cocktails at Trader Vic’s with Salvador Dalí and Joey Arias.
STUFF is more than a memoir; it’s a loopy, joyous, chaotic ride through the last half century of cultural chaos in the greatest city on earth. Whether you are an OG or a kid, a culture vulture, artist, design buff, fashion nerd, skater, collector, chef, cinephile, New Yorker, uptowner, downtowner, out-of-towner or something else entirely, STUFF will make you feel like you’re sitting with Kim in her garden high above Washington Square Park, her booming voice imploring you to pursue your life with compulsive enthusiasm. The book features an exclusive cover design by the elusive yet legendary artist Jim Joe, best known for designing the iconic album cover for Drake’s If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late.
Kim Hastreiter is a New Jersey native and consummate New Yorker. She is a cultural anthropologist and the original multi-hyphenate. An editor, publisher, curator and big idea person, she is best known for cofounding the legendary Paper magazine together with David Hershkovits, which they sold in 2017.
This book was published in conjunction with Amazing Unlimited
