A couple of weeks ago we hopped on a plane at City Airport and took the less than an hour flight over to Amsterdam for a long weekend. Although we’d booked it before I fell ill back in February, it never felt more like we needed a little break just to acknowledge how crazy the last couple of months have been and regroup with a little recharge of the batteries.
It’s been an incredible 13 years since we last visited Amsterdam which given that I feel like I’m still only 30 in my head doesn’t seem possible. It’s SUCH a brilliant city and I’m going to be writing some more posts about what to do over a long weekend when you visit and also some of the vegan places we found to eat. This post though, OH, this post is dedicated to the dreamiest hotel, Pulitzer Amsterdam.
Now of course it’s an international city and there are plenty of hotels you could stay at, including their version of Soho House and The Hoxton. But we stayed at Pulitzer Amsterdam on our last visit and loved it, and they’ve had a very modern and Instagrammable-refurb which meant that we made a beeline for it on this occasion and to be honest I’m not sure we’d ever stay anywhere else when we go back (and we will go back, we love it there).
So let me tell you a little bit about the hotel. Firstly, it’s bloomin interesting. Instead of doing what a lot of hotels do which is demolish history and rebuild something new and uninspiring in its place, the Pulitzer Amsterdam has incorporated a series of 17th and 18th century barge houses right into its design. It flanks two of Amsterdam’s key waterways, Prinsengracht which is the main front entrance to the hotel, and on the other side Keizersgracht where you can enter via the bar and restaurant. It’s been built in such a clever way that you can honestly close your eyes and imagine all the wealthy merchants going about their lives some 300 years ago and I absolutely somewhere that can tell a unique and interesting story.
Provenance is everything to the Pulitzer Amsterdam, which is the oldest 5 star hotel in the city having been begun in 1960 with a purchase of 12 dilapidated canal houses which over the years extended to 25. The renovation came about in 2015 and 2016 bringing the hotel right up to a modern day scratch whilst not compromising on its heritage in any way. The location is ideal, just around 20 minutes walk from the main station or a few minutes walk to the nearest tram stop. But you really don’t need public transport in Amsterdam since it’s such an easy-to-walk city. There’s no agenda, just head out of the hotel and walk the criss-cross streets to your heart’s content.
As for amenities, the hotel really does have everything you may need although we didn’t use too many facilities in our short stay and don’t typically bother with hotel breakfasts when we stay in cities since there are so many options on the doorstep. There’s a gym, a beautiful tranquil internal courtyard, restaurants, bars, meeting areas, so many nooks and crannies that allow you just go off and find a quiet spot. They even have their own canal boat which can you take on tours of the city and we used this last time we were there back in 2006.
There honestly isn’t a single thing I would change about the hotel oh and did I mention that it comes with Le Labo toiletries?! Yes, we like this a lot. It would definitely be my recommendation to anyone visiting to stay here if you’re not obsessed with either finding the best budget place or Air BnB. I’d probably travel in quite a different way if Pete and I weren’t together as I’m much more likely to do something less glitzy but hell, I don’t ever complain about the places we end up in. Such a beautiful and stylish hotel and I can’t wait to revisit.