Amsterdam Directions

by Martin Dunford

  One of the grandest of the grand cafés, overlooking the Amstel next to the university, with three floors, two terraces and a cool, light feel. A great place to nurse the Sunday papers – unusually you’ll find English ones here. Reasonably priced food too, and a great salad bar.

  Lokaal ’t Loosje

  Nieuwmarkt 32.

  Quiet old-style brown café that’s been here for two hundred years and looks it. Wonderful for late breakfasts and pensive afternoons.

  Luxembourg

  Spui 22.

  The prime watering hole of Amsterdam’s advertising and media brigade. If you can get past the crowds, it’s actually a long and deep bar with a good selection of snacks, and possibly the best hamburgers in town.

  De Twentsche Club

  Gravenstraat 10, www.detwentscheclub.nl. Thurs–Sun from 4pm.

  Roomy bar behind the Nieuwe Kerk that has a comfortable back room and a good programme of live jazz. The fortnightly Thursday film club offers an eclectic choice of movies and a three-course meal for €25. Above all, though, it’s the authentic nineteenth-century surroundings that appeal – little has changed, even down to the cash register.

  Van Kerkwijk

  Nes 41.

  On a thin, theatre-packed alley behind the Dam, this is a highly recommended bar. Wine comes in carafes filled from the barrel, along with a wide choice of cheeses and tasty meals to help it on its way.

  Wynand Fockink

  Pijlsteeg 31.

  Small and cosy bar hidden just behind Dam square. One of the older proeflokalen. Popular with local street musicians.

  Gay bars

  Argos

  Warmoesstraat 95. From 10pm.

  Europe’s oldest leather bar, with two bars and a raunchy cellar. Not for the weak-kneed.

  Cuckoo’s Nest

  Nieuwezijds Kolk 6. From 1pm.

  A cruisey leather bar with a long reputation, this is described as "the best place in town for chance encounters". Vast and infamous darkroom.

  Why Not

  Nieuwezijds Voorburgwal 28, www.whynot.nl. Live shows Thurs–Sat.

  Long-standing, intimate bar and club with a porno cinema above; happy hour 7–9pm.

  Clubs and venues

  Akhnaton

  Nieuwezijds Kolk 25; tel 020/624 3396, www.akhnaton.nl.

  A "Centre for World Culture", specializing in African and Latin American music and dance parties. On a good night, the place heaves with people.

  Bimhuis

  Oude Schans 73–77; tel 020/623 1361, www.bimhuis.nl.

  The city’s premier jazz venue for almost 28 years, with an excellent auditorium and ultramodern bar. Concerts Thurs–Sat, free sessions Mon–Wed. There’s also free live music in the bar on Sun at 4pm. Concert tickets are for sale on the day only.

  Dansen bij Jansen

  Handboogstraat 11; tel 020/620 1779, www.dansenbijjansen.nl. Daily 11pm–4am, Sat & Sun till 5am. €2 Sun–Wed, €4 Thurs–Sat, officially you need student ID to get in.

  Founded by – and for – students, and very popular. Plays a mixture of pop, chart and R&B.

  Waalse Kerk

  0Z Achterburgwal 157; tel 020/236 2236.

  Weekend and afternoon concerts of early- and chamber music – very soothing.

  The Grachtengordel

  Medieval Amsterdam was enclosed by the Singel, part of the city’s protective moat, but this is now just the first of five canals that reach right around the city centre, extending anticlockwise from Brouwersgracht to the River Amstel in a "girdle of canals" or Grachtengordel. This is without doubt the most charming part of the city, its lattice of olive-green waterways and dinky humpback bridges overlooked by street upon street of handsome seventeenth-century canal houses, almost invariably undisturbed by later development. It’s a subtle cityscape – full of surprises, with a bizarre carving here, an unusual facade stone (used to denote name and occupation) there. Architectural peculiarities aside, it is perhaps the district’s overall atmosphere that appeals rather than any specific sight. This chapter covers the southern sweep of the Grachtengordel from Raadhuisstraat to the Amstel. The western part – including the Anne Frankhuis – is covered in the following chapter, along with the Jordaan and western dock areas. There’s no obvious walking route around the Grachtengordel, indeed you may prefer to wander around as the mood takes you, but the description we’ve given below goes from north to south, taking in all the highlights on the way. On all three of the main canals, street numbers begin in the north and increase as you go south.

  Westermarkt to Leidsegracht

  Between Westermarkt and Leidsegracht, the main canals are intercepted by a trio of cross streets, which are themselves divided into shorter streets, mostly named after animals whose pelts were once used in the local tanning industry. There’s Reestraat (Deer Street), Hartenstraat (Hart), Berenstraat (Bear) and Wolvenstraat (Wolf), not to mention Huidenstraat (Street of Hides) and Runstraat – a "run" being a bark used in tanning. The tanners are long gone and today these are eminently appealing shopping streets, where you can buy everything from carpets to handmade chocolates, toothbrushes to beeswax candles.

  The Woonbootmuseum

  Prinsengracht 296. March–Oct Wed–Sun 11am–5pm; Nov–Feb Sat–Sun 11am–5pm. €3.

  This 1914 Dutch houseboat doubles as a tourist attraction with a handful of explanatory plaques about life on the water. Some 3000 barges and houseboats are connected to the city’s gas and electricity networks. They are regularly inspected and strict controls ensure their numbers don’t proliferate.

  The Felix Meritis Building

  Keizersgracht 324.

  A Neoclassical monolith of 1787, this mansion was built to house the artistic and scientific activities of the eponymous society, which was the cultural focus of the city’s upper crust for nearly a hundred years. Dutch cultural aspirations did not, however, impress everyone. It’s said that when Napoleon visited the city the entire building was redecorated for his reception, only to have him stalk out in disgust, claiming that the place stank of tobacco. Oddly enough, it later became the headquarters of the Dutch Communist Party, but they sold it to the council who now lease it to the Felix Meritis Foundation for experimental and avant-garde art workshops, discussions and debates.

  * * *

  The canals

  The canals of the Grachtengordel were dug in the seventeenth century as part of a comprehensive plan to extend the boundaries of a city no longer able to accommodate its burgeoning population. Increasing the area of the city from two to seven square kilometres was a monumental task, and the conditions imposed by the council were strict. The three main waterways – Herengracht, Keizersgracht and Prinsengracht – were set aside for the residences and businesses of the richer and more influential Amsterdam merchants, while the radial cross-streets were reserved for more modest artisans’ homes; meanwhile, immigrants, newly arrived to cash in on Amsterdam’s booming economy, were assigned, albeit informally, the Jodenhoek and the Jordaan. In the Grachtengordel, everyone, even the wealthiest merchant, had to comply with a set of strict and detailed planning regulations. In particular, the council prescribed the size of each building plot – the frontage was set at thirty feet, the depth two hundred – and although there was a degree of tinkering, the end result was the loose conformity you can see today: tall, narrow residences, whose individualism is mainly restricted to the stylistic permutations amongst the gables.

  The earliest extant gables, dating from the early seventeenth century, are crow-stepped gables, but these were largely superseded from the 1650s onwards by neck gables and bell gables. Some are embellished, others aren’t, many have decorative cornices, some don’t, and the fanciest, which almost invariably date from the eighteenth century, sport full-scale balustrades. The plainest gables are those of former warehouses, where the deep-arched and shuttered windows line up to either side of loft doors, which were once used for loading and unloading goods, winched by pulley from the street down below. Indeed,
outside pulleys remain a common feature of houses and warehouses alike, and are often still in use as the easiest way of moving furniture into the city’s myriad apartments.

  * * *

  The Bijbels Museum

  Herengracht 366–368, www.bijbelsmuseum.nl. Mon–Sat 10am–5pm, Sun 11am–5pm. €6.

  The graceful and commanding Cromhouthuizen, at Herengracht 364–370, consists of four matching stone mansions, frilled with tendrils, carved fruit and scrollwork, and graced by dinky little bull’s-eye windows and elegant gables. They were built in the 1660s for one of Amsterdam’s wealthy merchant families, the Cromhouts, and two of them now house the Bijbels Museum. This contains a thorough selection of Bibles, including the first Dutch-language Bible ever printed, dating from 1477, and a series of idiosyncratic models of Solomon’s Temple and the Jewish Tabernacle plus a scattering of archeological finds from Palestine and Egypt.

  Leidseplein

  Lying on the edge of the Grachtengordel, Leidseplein is the bustling hub of Amsterdam’s nightlife, a rather cluttered and disorderly open space that has never had much character. The square once marked the end of the road in from Leiden and, as horse-drawn traffic was banned from the centre long ago, it was here that the Dutch left their horses and carts – a sort of equine car park. Today, it’s quite the opposite: continual traffic made up of trams, bikes, cars and pedestrians gives the place a frenetic feel, and the surrounding side streets are jammed with bars, restaurants and clubs in a bright jumble of jutting signs and neon lights. On a good night, however, Leidseplein can be Amsterdam at its carefree, exuberant best.

  Stadsschouwburg

  Leidseplein www.stadschouwburgamsterdam.nl.

  Leidseplein holds one building of architectural note, the grandiose Stadsschouwburg, a neo-Renaissance edifice dating from 1894 which was so widely criticized for its clumsy vulgarity that the city council of the day temporarily withheld the money for decorating the exterior. Home to the National Ballet and Opera until the Muziektheater was completed on Waterlooplein in 1986, it is now used for theatre, dance and music performances, as well as hosting visiting English-language theatre companies. However, its most popular function is as the place where the Ajax football team gather on the balcony to wave to the crowds whenever they win anything – as they often do.

  The American Hotel

  Leidsekade 97.

  Just off the square, the American Hotel is one of the city’s oddest buildings, a monumental and slightly disconcerting rendering of Art Nouveau, with angular turrets, chunky dormer windows and fancy brickwork. Completed in 1902, the present structure takes its name from its demolished predecessor, which was decorated with statues and murals of North American scenes. Inside the present hotel is the Café Americain, once the fashionable haunt of Amsterdam’s literati, but now a mainstream location for coffee and lunch. The Art Nouveau decor is well worth a peek – an artful combination of stained glass, shallow arches and geometric patterned brickwork.

  Leidsestraat to Metz & Co

  Heading northeast from Leidseplein, Leidsestraat is a crowded shopping street, a long, slender gauntlet of fashion and shoe shops of little distinction that leads across the girdle of canals up towards the Singel and the Flower Market. En route, at the corner of Keizersgracht, is Metz & Co. At the time of its construction, this was the tallest commercial building in the city – one reason why the owners were able to entice Gerrit Rietveld, the leading architectural light of the De Stijl movement, to add a rooftop glass and metal showroom in 1933. The showroom has survived and has been turned into a café offering one of the best views over the centre in this predominantly low-rise city.

  The Spiegelkwartier

  One block east of Metz & Co, along Keizersgracht, is Nieuwe Spiegelstraat, an appealing mixture of bookshops and corner cafés that extends south into Spiegelstraat to form the Spiegelkwartier – home to the pricey end of Amsterdam’s antiques trade and well worth an idle wander. While you’re here look in on De Appel, a lively centre for contemporary art at Nieuwe Spiegelstraat 10 (Tues–Sun 11am–6pm; €2.50, www.deappel.nl).

  De Gouden Bocht

  Nieuwe Spiegelstraat meets the elegant sweep of Herengracht near the west end of the so-called De Gouden Bocht (Golden Bend), where the canal is overlooked by a long sequence of double-fronted mansions that are some of the most opulent dwellings in the city. Most of the houses here were extensively remodelled in the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Characteristically, they have double stairways leading to the entrance, underneath which the small door was for the servants, whilst up above the majority are topped off by the ornamental cornices that were fashionable at the time. Classical references are common, both in form – pediments, columns and pilasters – and decoration, from scrolls and vases through to geometric patterns inspired by ancient Greece.

  The Museum Willet-Holthuysen

  Herengracht 605. Mon–Fri 10am–5pm, Sat & Sun 11am–5pm. €4.

  This museum is billed as "a peep behind the curtains into an historic Amsterdam canal house", which just about sums it up. The house itself dates from 1685, but the interior was remodelled by successive members of the coal-trading Holthuysen family until the last of the line, Sandra Willet-Holthuysen, gifted her home and its contents to the city in 1895. Renovated a number of years ago, most of the public rooms, notably the Blue Room and the Dining Room, have now been returned to their original eighteenth-century Rococo appearance – a flashy and ornate style that the Dutch merchants held to be the epitome of refinement and good taste. At the back of the house are the formal gardens, a neat pattern of miniature hedges graced by the occasional stone statue. There’s a small collection of glass, silver, majolica and ceramics in the basement.

  The Amstel and the Magere Brug

  The Grachtengordel comes to an abrupt halt at the River Amstel, long the main route into the city, with goods arriving by barge and boat to be traded for the imported materials held in Amsterdam’s many warehouses. The Magere Brug (Skinny Bridge) is the most famous and arguably the cutest of the city’s many swing bridges. Legend has it that this bridge, which dates back to about 1670, replaced an even older and skinnier version, originally built by two sisters who lived on either side of the river and were fed up with having to walk so far to see each other.

  The Amstel Sluizen

  The Amstel Sluizen – or Amstel locks – are closed every night when the authorities begin the process of sluicing out the canals. A huge pumping station on an island out to the east of the city then starts to pump fresh water from the IJsselmeer into the canal system; similar locks on the west side of the city are left open for the surplus to flow into the IJ and, from there, out to sea. The watery content of the canals is thus refreshed every three nights – though, despite this, and with three centuries of algae, prams, shopping trolleys and a few hundred rusty bikes, the water remains only appealing as long as you’re not actually in it.

  The Amstelveld, Amstelkerk and Reguliersgracht

  Doubling back from the Amstel sluizen, turn left along the north side of Prinsengracht and you soon reach the small open space of the Amstelveld, an oasis of calm that rarely sees visitors, with the plain seventeenth-century white wooden Amstelkerk occupying one of its corners. The Monday market here sells flowers and plants, and is much less of a scrum than the Bloemenmarkt, with lots of friendly advice on what to buy. It’s here also that Prinsengracht intersects with Reguliersgracht, probably the prettiest of the three surviving radial canals that cut across the Grachtengordel – its dainty humpback bridges and greening waters overlooked by charming seventeenth- and eighteenth-century canal houses.

  Museum Van Loon

  Keizersgracht 672. Fri–Mon 11am–5pm. €4.50.

  The Museum Van Loon boasts the finest accessible canal house interior in Amsterdam. Built in 1672, and first occupied by the artist and pupil of Rembrandt, Ferdinand Bol, the house has been returned to something akin to its eighteenth-century appearance, with acres of wood panelling and fan
cy stucco work. Look out also for the ornate copper balustrade on the staircase, into which is worked the name "Van Hagen-Trip" (after a one-time owner of the house); the Van Loons later filled the spaces between the letters with fresh iron curlicues to prevent their children falling through. The top-floor landing has several pleasant paintings sporting Roman figures and one of the bedrooms – the "painted room" – is decorated with a Romantic painting of Italy – a favourite motif in Amsterdam from around 1750 to 1820. The oddest items are the fake bedroom doors: the eighteenth-century owners were so keen to avoid any lack of symmetry that they camouflaged the real bedroom doors and created imitation, decorative doors in the "correct" position instead.

  Rembrandtplein

  One of the larger open spaces in the city centre, Rembrandtplein is a dishevelled bit of greenery that was formerly Amsterdam’s butter market. It was renamed in 1876, and is today one of the city’s nightlife centres, although its crowded restaurants and bars are firmly tourist-targeted. Rembrandt’s statue stands in the middle, his back wisely turned against the square’s worst excesses, which include live (but deadly) outdoor muzak. Of the prodigious number of cafés and bars here, only the café of the Schiller Hotel at no. 26 stands out, with an original Art Deco interior somewhat reminiscent of an ocean liner.

  The Tuschinski

  Reguliersbreestraat 26–28.

  Tucked in among Reguliersbreestraat’s slot-machine arcades and sex shops, the Tuschinski is the city’s most extraordinary cinema, with a marvellously well-preserved Art Deco interior. Opened in 1921 by a Polish Jew, Abram Tuschinski, the cinema boasts Expressionist paintings, coloured marbles and a wonderful carpet, handwoven in Marrakesh to an original design. Tuschinski himself died in Auschwitz in 1942, and there’s a plaque in the cinema’s foyer in his memory.

  The Munttoren and Bloemenmarkt

  Tiny Muntplein is dominated by the Munttoren, an imposing fifteenth-century tower that was once part of the old city wall. Later, the tower was adopted as the municipal mint – hence its name – and Hendrik de Keyser, in one of his last commissions, added a flashy spire in 1620. A few metres away, the floating Bloemenmarkt, or flower market (daily 9am–5pm, though some stalls close on Sun), extends along the southern bank of the Singel. Popular with locals and tourists alike, the market is one of the main suppliers of flowers to central Amsterdam, but its blooms and bulbs now share stall space with souvenir clogs, garden gnomes and Delftware.