Beurs van Berlage, Amsterdam

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The huge and block red brick building that you will pass by in Damrak on your left coming from the main train station is the Beurs van Berlage. It was built as a commodity exchange around the 1900. It serves as a conference venue.

Funny cuz I thought it's a beer factory - beurs, beers, can you blame me?

Reason why am sharing the brief info for some other people as dumb as I am --- if there's one, or am I the only one? C'mon seriously...

The Beurs van Berlage is a building on the Damrak, in the center of Amsterdam. It was designed as a commodity exchange by architect Hendrik Petrus Berlage and constructed between 1896 and 1903. It influenced many modernist architects, in particular functionalists and the Amsterdam School. It is now used as a conference venue.

The building is constructed of red brick, with an iron and glass roof and stone piers, lintels and corbels. Its entrance is under a large clock tower, while inside lie three large multi-story halls formerly used as trading floors, with offices and communal facilities grouped around them.

The aim of the architect was to reject the styles of the past. To the modern eye, the design may still appear a little fussy, but at the time, most apparent were its sweeping planes and open plan interiors. It has stylistic similarities with some earlier buildings, for instance St Pancras station, but there the functional train shed was disguised by a neo-Gothic facade.

On 2 February 2002 the civil ceremony of the wedding of Crown Prince Willem-Alexander and Máxima Zorreguieta took place in the Beurs van Berlage.

This long red-bricked building to the left of the Damrak used to be the Stock Exchange. It was built between 1898 and 1903, and named after its architect, a pupil of Cuypers.

This imposing building is considered a milestone in modern Dutch architecture.

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The Beurs van Berlage is a building on the Damrak. It was designed as a commodity exchange constructed at the end of 19th Century. It is now used as a conference venue and as an exhibition centre. The building is constructed of red brick, with an iron and glass roof and stone piers, lintels and corbels. Its entrance is under a large clock tower, while inside lie three large multi-story halls formerly used as trading floors, with offices and communal facilities grouped around them. In fact the building looks like a church outside. Don't you think so?

El Beurs van Berlange es un edificio en el Damrak. Se diseñó como una Bolsa de Valores construida a finales del siglo XIX. Ahora se utiliza como una sala de conferencias y un centro de exposiciones. El edificio se construyó en ladrillo rojo, con un techo de metal y cristal, así como piedra en pilares, dinteles y ménsulas. Su entrada está bajo una gran torre con reloj, mientras que dentro hay halls distribuídos en tres plantas antiguamente usados como salas de negociación, con oficinas y servicios comunes en torno a ellas. En realidad el edificio parece por fuera una iglesia. ¿No lo crees?

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For E22.50 for a ticket we saw the controversial Bodies Exhibition at Beurs van Berlage. We hadn't planned to see it and didn't even know it was on but we were in the area and the queue outside seemed to disappear quite quickly so we thought we would have a look.

The bodies are real but due to the various preservation techniques used, they have a bright pink, plasticised appearance... I found it very difficult to accept that they were in fact once real living human beings (99% Chinese males in fact) but they are. There is also a section on human embryos, which comes with a warning and can be easily avoided as it is in a separate area.

The museum is open from 10am to 6pm and on Thursday to Saturday they are open until 10pm. There are lots of assistants around to answer any questions you may have about the exhibition.
Photography is strictly forbidden.

There is a very good and surprisingly reasonably priced cafe here that you can visit without paying an entry to the museum. We had soup and Tortilla and guacamole dip for a few Euro.

In the center of the city, between Royal Palace and the central railway station you can see the long red building. It is stock exchange, built by Berlage architect in 1898-1903. All tradings happened in the building but already in 1913 there was no place for everything and a part of operations were moved to other buildings. The last trade session was in 1998, and since 1987 exhibitions and some similiar events take place in the building.

This former stock exchange building, the beurs van berlage, was constructed by Hendrik Petrus Berlage in 1903 and was in such use until 1984. It is made of red brick stones and an outstanding example for the arhcitecture of the early 20th century. Today , it houses a small permanent exhibition about the history of the building as well as events and other temporal expositions.

Beurs van Berlage has become the unofficial but common name for this building, and just that name shows what an enormous impact this design had on Netherlands' architecture. This former commodities exchange by architect H.P. Berlage is one of the most famous and important buildings, if not the most important, in Dutch 20th century architecture. It was built from 1898 until 1903, but was used in its original function only for a few years. It did turn out to be a major influence for many architects because its style was totally new, not a shadow of the past. Ironically, the architect of this monument of capitalism was a socialist. The building nowadays is used for various cultural and social occassions.