Happy Hotelier

Monday August 4, 2008 the former Holland America Line (H.A.L.) Liner and later Cruise Ship “SS Rotterdam”, Dutch and Rotterdam Pride, was welcomed back in Rotterdam. There it will be berthed to serve as a Hotel, Congress Center, Theater, School and Museum, after extensive renovations. Currently the owner, a Rotterdam Social Building Society, has […]

Clearing up and posting old drafts:
Expat Blogs are a wonderful source of information about a destination through the eyes of a foreigner. Here are 10 of them relating to The Netherlands.
Through Expat Blogs, a community of expat bloggers that charts the various expats in various countries, I found some interesting foreigners blogging about The Netherlands.

A […]

The original Vermeer painting “The Girl with the Pearl Earring” is to admire here in The Hague in the museum Mauritshuis. It is featured on their homepage as well.
Not until he used this example, I noticed Scott Wade’s Dirty Car Art.
Like any reasonably creative and curious human, Scott can’t resist a dirty rear car window. […]

I have been invited to have a look at the Cinedans premiere in Amsterdam tonight. Cinedans is an International Dance Filmfestival, dedicated solely to films that have a connection with Dance and held simultaneously in three Dutch cities: Amsterdam, Den Haag and Utrecht.

Find more videos like this on Cinedans

The opening film is quite […]

With Spain we have a worthy European Football Champion now that it defeated Germany with 1-0.

In Basel the Dutch team lost from the Russians under a Dutch coach.
Yesterday The Swiss City of Basel thanked the Dutch Football fans in an ad of a whole page in a Dutch Newspaper for the good time they […]

The CitizenM Room has various neat design features:
Its 2 m long and 2 m wide Bed under the window with, on the west side of the hotel, nice views on one of the landing strips of Schiphol Airport:
Under the bed, like in yachts, there is a huge trunk size drawer where you can stash your […]

The Dutch Newspaper Algemeen Dagblad commissioned Dutch Photographer Erwin Olaf to make a series of photos of the Dutch Football (Ok Soccer for our American Friends) Team for its 2008 European Championships Special.
Olaf made a spectacular almost Spartan Warrior like series.
Above photo is of Edwin van der Sar, the Dutch goalkeeper who saved some shots […]

Always when I want to process some of my pending posts I stumble on something that draws my attention: This time a photo of a beheaded KLM airplane:

Which made me think:”How long will this National Pride of The Netherlands live as a separate brand after the take over by Air France?”
I found the duly photo […]

The Amsterdam College Hotel Front

Some of my prior posts in the Dutch Design category I forgot to number. I found the correct number:-)
Dutch designers Colin Finnegan and Gerard Glintmeijer of FG Stijl have had a important influence in the design of the Amsterdam College Hotel. I now have access to press material from their site […]

The Dutch Do Dance! Even their Queen!

Happy Queen’s Day!
On January 30, 2008 our Queen Beatrix reached the venerable age of 70. The Dutch Queen´s birthday is celebrated officially on April 30th, since Queen Beatrix ascended the Throne. It is a public holiday and everybody goes out partying. In Amsterdam you can walk over the heads […]

The Dutch Don’t Dance, Photo © by Wouter Hogendorp and Canon

Recently I found this apt picture with apt title and color.

The picture is apt because the wooden shoes or clogs stand as a sort of fake national symbol for The Netherlands, whereas hardly any Dutchman (or Cloggy as I am actually teasingly call my […]

Here we go again with my “Nothing Zen” series
A fellow TrendHunter, a very trend setting young lady from Down Under, younger than my 2 daughters (who, by the way, are two very trend setting young ladies themselves) is going to attend a conference at the VU university of Amsterdam in July and asks me whether […]

Titled Whitney Museum to Receive $131 Million Gift, Carol Vogel of The New York Times reports that Leonard A. Lauder, chairman of the Estée Lauder Companies and, according to Forbes magazine, with a net worth of $3.2 billion in 2007, said on Tuesday in a telephone interview that his art foundation would give the […]

Pehac, Pan-European Hotel Acquisition Company N.V., is a blank check company recently formed under the laws of the Netherlands as a public company with limited liability (naamloze vennootschap or N.V.) to serve as a vehicle for an acquisition of one or more operating businesses in the hotel industry in Europe. It is AEX listed since […]

When launched Qbic got featured on CNN. I didn’t see it myself. I red the transcript once, but thanks to fellow Blogger Época Alta I found the Youtube link:

The first Qbic Hotel is four months in operation now and its occupancy rates are reportedly over 90%.