• 1. Where to Stay
• 2. Where to Eat
• 3. What to Do
• 4. Insider’s Tip
• 5. An Oddball Day

The Dylan on the Keizersgracht canal.   (Photo: Courtesy of the Dylan)

The most radical rooms are at the Lloyd Hotel (from 95 euros), an emigrant boarding house turned experimental design hotel. Its 116 rooms range from 90 square meters to couldn't-swing-a-mouse tiny. 411 is the cheapest room with a river view.

For nineties-style minimalism with a new-millennium update — such as a new cow-bone-fronted bar — go for the 41-room Dylan (from 260 euros). The ultimate minimalist sleep is in the "Loft" — an almost-all-white room.

Canal-side, the Times Hotel's 34 rooms (from 149 euros) have primary-color carpets, white walls, and floor-to-ceiling glossy prints by Dutch masters.

Miauw (from 145 euros) is a four-suite hotel opening in November. Its lobby will also serve as a concept store, a gallery and shop space that exhibits and sells furniture from the hotel's rooms and avant-garde clothes from Analik and Erotokritos.

Published on October 11, 2006 as a web exclusive.