Joy Division Singer’s Kitchen Table to Fetch $13K on EBay

The kitchen table owned by the late Ian Curtis, singer for the post-punk band Joy Division, is up for auction on eBay. The item has already collected 63 bids and its current price is set at 8,200 GBP, or approximately $13,000.  

Curtis’ suicide on May 18, 1980 is one of music’s most tragic gone-too-soon tales. As chronicled in the 2007 movie, Control (based on widow Deborah Curtis‘ moving memoir, Touching from a Distance), the frontman suffered from epilepsy and depression which contributed to his desperate state on the eve of the band’s first North American tour. 

Curtis took his own life by hanging himself in the kitchen of his home at 77 Barton Street in Macclesfield, Great Britain, 20 miles outside of Manchester. He was married and a father to a one-year-old daughter at the time.

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Fans of the influential band can own a true piece of rock history with this piece, albeit morbidly. Made of wood, the table is describe as 75 cm wide and 98 cm long with extension flaps that add another 28 cm. 

According to NME, following Curtis’ death, Debbie Curtis sold the house and many of its contents to a neighbor, Dorothy Smith, who operated it as a bed and breakfast. Smith passed down the table to her daughter in 1996 when she got married and settled down in Macclesfield.

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The table was then returned to the Curtis family in 2005, and, although offered to director Anton Corbijn for the filming of Control, it was not used. 

The table ended up back in the hands of Natalie Curtis, Ian and Debbie’s daughter, but was later sold on eBay to its current owner, who is himself a “struggling artist,” according to the eBay listing.

See more images of the table along with letters of authenticity here. The auction is scheduled to end on Nov. 13.

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