Page 124 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide 2016 - Amsterdam

122 ❯❯ Amsterdam Area by Area

but giving an uninterrupted view
from the Rijksmuseum to the
Concert gebouw. It has children’s
play areas and a pond that is frozen
over to form an ice-rink in winter.
Various events are staged here –
from circuses to political demon-
strations – and it is the setting for
Hel van Vuur (Hell of Fire), a
monument to all gypsies perse cuted
by the Nazis, as well as the
Ravensbrück Memorial (see p50).
The district is one of the wealth iest
in Amsterdam, with broad streets
lined by grand houses.
Coster Diamonds
8
MAP C5 • Paulus Potterstraat
2–8 • Tram 2, 5 • 020 305 5555
• Open 9am–5pm daily
• www.costerdiamonds.com
Founded in 1840 and now occupying
Concertgebouw three grand villas, Coster is one of
a handful of diamond workshops
Concertgebouw
6 offering free guided tours. These
MAP C6 • Concertgebouwplein 30-minute tours give you the
10 • Tram 2, 3, 5, 12, 16, 24 • 0900 opportunity to observe stone
671 8345 • Box office open 1–7pm graders, cutters and polishers
Mon–Fri, 10am–7pm Sat–Sun • at work. In 1852, the Koh-i-Noor
Guided tours 12:30pm Sun, 5pm Mon (Mountain of Light) diamond was
and Fri • www.concertgebouw.nl re-polished here for the British
One of the world’s great concert Crown Jewels, and a replica of the
halls, the Concertgebouw was built
in 1888, designed by A L van Gendt in
Neo-Dutch Renaissance style with a DIAMONDS
colonnaded Neo-Classical façade. In Amsterdam has been a centre of
the 1980s, the building was discovered diamond cutting, polishing and trading
to be in danger of collapse. In time since the 16th century (below), when
for the centenary of both the concert Jews, fleeing the Spanish Inquisition,
hall and its world-famous orchestra, brought the business to the city. The
new foundations were laid, and the trade flourished in the late 19th
century with the influx of Jews from
building was restored and enlarged. Antwerp, many of them skilled in the
Amazingly, all this took place without industry, and with the import of
it having to close. diamonds from South Africa.
Museumplein
7
MAP C6 • Tram 2, 3, 5, 12, 16, 24
The city’s largest square was first
landscaped in 1872, but it was ruined
in 1953 when a hair-raising stretch
of road – which locals nicknamed
“the shortest motorway in Europe” –
was built across it. Completely
redesigned between 1990 and 1996,
it is now a great swathe of green,
still more functional than beautiful,

120-123_Top_10_Amsterdam_Area_Intro.indd 122 09/03/2016 16:06