Amsterdam Insider Tips: What Twenty Years of Living Here Taught Me
I have lived in Amsterdam my whole life. Here is what I would tell someone arriving for the first time.
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What Amsterdam’s Expat Community Actually Looks Like
Amsterdam has one of Europe’s largest expat populations. Here is what that community is actually like from the inside.
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Amsterdam’s Brown Cafes: What They Are and Why They Still Matter
The bruine kroeg is Amsterdam’s most distinctive institution. Here is what it actually is.
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De Pijp: Amsterdam’s Most Overrated and Still Most Interesting Neighbourhood
Everyone says De Pijp has lost it. Everyone saying that is still there. Here is what it actually is.
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King’s Day in Amsterdam: What It Actually Looks Like
I’ve done Koningsdag in Amsterdam thirty-one times. Here’s what you need to know and where to actually be on 27 April.
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Amsterdam Without the Tourists: When and Where to Find the Real City
The tourist version of Amsterdam and the real city coexist in the same streets. Here’s how to spend more time in one than the other.
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Noord in April: The Things That Still Work and Where to Find Them
People ask me about Noord like it’s a place they need tips for. Which is fine — I give tips. But I want to be clear about what Noord is in April specifically, because spring changes the neighbourhood in ways that are easy to miss if you only read the annual pieces about how it’s…
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The Music Scene in Amsterdam Is Smaller Than You Think and Better For It
Amsterdam has a reputation for nightlife. The music scene is something different — smaller, more specific, and genuinely worth following if you know where to look.
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Pllek on a Friday Night: What It Tells You About Noord Right Now
I’ve been going to Pllek since before it was what it is now. That’s not me being precious about it — it’s just true. The place on the NDSM wharf started as a container bar with a terrace and a function room and a programming ethos that matched what Noord was at the time: improvised,…
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De Pijp on a Sunday, Three Scaffolds Later
I cycled through De Pijp on Sunday. I do this most weeks — it’s on the route from Noord to Oost and back via the IJ ferry, the loop I do when I need to clear my head before the week starts again. My parents are still there, same flat on Van Woustraat they’ve had…
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Javastraat, Amsterdam-Oost: What It Was, What It Is, What That Means
Javastraat is not a famous street. It does not appear on the lists of Amsterdam’s most photogenic locations. What it has — or had, depending on when you first walked it — is the particular quality of a street that was genuinely part of a neighbourhood rather than a destination within one. What it was…
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The Jordaan: What It Is and What It Isn’t
The Jordaan has been famous for being charming for so long that the charm has curdled slightly. Here’s what’s still genuinely worth understanding about it.
