Visit the Purple Roofs Netherlands Page

The city of Amsterdam

The city of Amsterdam has one of the most important intact historical city centers in the world.

The historical city centre is dominated by the famous canal houses, crowned by ornamented gable tops, that have been built as residences for the wealthy merchants and citizens.

During the commercially successful Golden Age, late 1500 until late 1600, Amsterdam becomes the staple market of the world. The city gets the unique ring of canals and the characteristic appearance is established.

The historical and monumental character of Amsterdam’s city centre is specially determined by the 1600th and 1700th century houses. But also Amsterdam’s warehouses are worth being mentioned here.

Its architecture is unique in the world.
The city contains around 6,700 historical monuments, has about 100 kilometers of canals and 400 stone bridges.

Nowadays, Amsterdam is a colorful city with an intense cultural life which you can easily explore by foot, boat or bike.

Except for the historical centre and the canals, famous highlights are the Rijksmuseum (National Gallery) where you find works from Vermeer and Rembrandt – including his masterpiece, the Night Watch; the Van Gogh Museum where you can see the most of his paintings under one roof and the Hermitage Museum Amsterdam.

Within walking distance, also in the city centre, you will also find the Jewish Historical Museum and The Anne Frank House.

Museum Hermitage Amsterdam opened in 2009 and, in addition to its permanent collection, presents this year the exhibition “Matisse to Malevich, Pioneers of Modern Art” from the Hermitage in St.Petersburg, Russia.

Also this year, Sail 2010 will take place again. Sail 2010 is a nautical spectacle which program includes an impressive fleet of Tall Ships from all around the world and a unique collection of Dutch sailing heritage.

Amsterdam, a welcoming city for gay and lesbian travelers

Amsterdam is the capital of the Netherlands and has an inviting and tolerant atmosphere which has attracted many different people already since the Middle Ages. The multicultural character of the city attracts today also many gay women and men from all around the world.

The Netherlands is one of the most liberal democracies in Europe and specially Amsterdam is one of most liberal cities in Europe for gay and lesbian travelers.

Amsterdam is a trendy city and the gay ‘scene’ includes shopping, dining, many gay and lesbian bars and dance clubs. You’ll find there also plenty of lesbian and gay, and also gay friendly hotels, guesthouses and apartments.

In Amsterdam everything is within walking distance. While not being a huge city Amsterdam is very cosmopolitan. With a population of about 800.000 inhabitants the city has a relatively large gay scene.

Except for the numerous bars, cafes and clubs in the city, many gay dance parties are organized weekly or monthly.

But you’ll find there also gay and lesbian bookshops and films and many other activities like choirs or sport. The 5th Gay Games in 1998, Friendship ’98, took place in Amsterdam, the first Gay Games to take place in Europe. About a quarter of a million of visitors from all over the world attended the sport and cultural program during August 1998. The City of Amsterdam also welcomed about 13.000 registered participants.

The Pink Film Days, Amsterdam’s gay and lesbian film festival takes place every year.

Most gay men bars and cafes are situated within two different areas in the city center. The most trendy and popular gay scene is located in the street Reguliersdwarsstraat and around the neighboring streets Amstel and Halvemaansteeg, also very popular by local gay men.

Within walking distance from this area, you’ll find the streets Warmoesstraat and Zeedijk where also the Amsterdam leather scene is situated for the most part.

Gay women can visit different bar/restaurants and cafes such as Saarein or Vivelavie. These are small and pleasant places when you can easily can come in contact with the local lesbian scene. Flirtation, Garbo for Women and Girlesque organize periodically very popular girl-girl parties.

There is also a souvenir and information centre for gay tourists in Amsterdam called Pink Point. The kiosk is to be found at the Westermarkt, by the church Westerkerk and the HomoMonument.

Since 1987 Amsterdam has a Homomonument (photo: Pink Point www.pinkpoint.org). The monument commemorates the gay victims of war and also the gay and lesbian victims of oppression all over the world. Specially on the 4th of May, the Netherlands’ National War Victims Remembrance Day, many people also come together at the Homomonument to remember the gay and lesbian victims.

Spectacular Gay highlights every year are the canal parade Amsterdam Gay Pride and Queen´s Day on the April 30th.

The Amsterdam Gay Pride week is organized around the first week of August. Its Canal Gay Parade on Saturday is undoubtedly the greatest and most colorful show of the Pride weekend.

On April 30th Dutch people celebrate Queen’s Day. Specially in Amsterdam this holiday became an unique carnival-like happening. Queen’s Day is a huge, but also relaxed and cheerful party all across the city with its origins in a special regulation which allowed anyone, once a year on Queen’s Day, to trade on the streets without the need of any permit. Nowadays this enormous street market is mainly about having fun but still it does offer the possibility to buy, but specially sell all kind of things that became unnecessary at home, mostly for a symbolic price.

As you can probably imagine, the name of this holiday made it become a big and most funny gay party. Especially during the evening, also the day before, gay bars and clubs are really crowed, inside and outside.

Prinx Studios is gay-owned and are situated in a canal house within the Amsterdam historical city centre. While during the day a lively Amsterdam’s historical and cultural neighborhood, the location is quiet. You will be surrounded by typical historical houses and the rest of the canals are just around the corner. The Museum Area is just 100 meter away from the house and most attractions are within walking distance. In the neighborhood you can also find many breakfast cafes and restaurants and most of the well-known gay hot spots.

The studios have been very recently renovated (2008) and face either a quiet street or the canal Lijnbaansgracht. Besides the bathroom, each studio has a living-dining area – with cooking facilities – and a bed area. On request we can prepare either a double bed or twins. In your fridge, you will find a bottle of Catalan sparkling wine cava and orange juice as a welcome drink.