Sometimes it’s lovely exploring your home town, isn’t it? Last weekend the hub and I set off in beautiful autumn sunshine towards de Oude Kerk in the Red Light District. Awesome is a tragically overused word but the light inside the church was so spiritual, that it truly was awesome in the old-fashioned sense, i.e. it inspired awe in the beholder. The golden autumnal light flooding through the plain glass window, so typical of a Calvinist church, was profoundly moving.

As I looked out of the window from a side room in the church I saw a backpacking tourist agreeing a price with one of the girls who works in the windows surrounding the Oudekerksplein. Where else in the world could one witness such a mundane and yet age-old transaction from inside a church? Only in the Netherlands, where spiritual and physical appetites are catered for in the same neighbourhood, De Wallen. 

After having Dutch apple pie in the very pretty church courtyard we hopped on our bikes and crossed the water by ferry and visited The Eye Film Institute, our favourite haunt this summer/autumn. After that we cycled towards the NDSM werf and stumbled across a pop-up event, Vintage per Kilo, and it works like this; a load of vintage and second hand quality clothing is displayed in an old building, last weekend it was the Schram Studios, at the door you collect a plastic bag, fill up with goodies, have your goods weighed and pay per kilo. Simple as that, just like buying veg in a grocer’s! I found a fabulous seventies dress (fits like a glove) and a pair of Magli (Italian makers) brogues. After that we wandered on down to Van Dijk & Ko, Amsterdam’s largest stockist of brocanterie. In a nutshell, another super day discovering and rediscovering old and new places and events in this wonderful city!

Oudekerk, Sept

Oudekerk, Sept