Escort De Pijp, the lively south of the city

Arrival within the hour is typical, and often quicker for a hotel inside the district. Market days bring delivery vans to the Albert Cuypstraat, and Friday nights on the terraces are busy, but distances are short. Late at night, once the terraces have closed, the streets fall quiet and arrivals are quicker still. If you are staying near the RAI during a large congress or trade fair, send your message a little earlier, since taxis are in demand on those evenings.

De Pijp favours the relaxed and the spontaneous. An aperitivo on a terrace near the Gerard Douplein, a small restaurant with a long wine list, a cocktail bar with low lighting, then back to the hotel in no particular hurry. Luna, bold and independent, has a taste for good wine and the theatre. Molly is warm and playful, and knows a proper cocktail when she sees one. Rosa prefers galleries and record shops, earthy and easy company. Vanessa, curious and relaxed, enjoys a conversation that wanders between languages and travel.

The district is informal by nature. Your companion dresses for the evening you describe, whether that means a terrace or a tailored dinner.

Many streets in De Pijp are named after painters, and several run side by side: the Ferdinand Bolstraat, the Eerste van der Helststraat, the Govert Flinckstraat. Include the full street name and house number, and for an apartment the floor, since most buildings here divide into several homes behind a single front door. If your hotel is on the Stadhouderskade, name it; the boulevard is long and busy with trams.

Every visitor to De Pijp finds the Albert Cuypmarkt first, a long street of stalls open six days a week, busiest in the late morning and gone by early evening. The former Heineken brewery on the Stadhouderskade receives visitors in its old brewing halls, and the Sarphatipark, with its fountain and ponds, gives the grid a green centre. To the east, the Amstel curves past the district toward the Berlagebrug, and a riverside walk at dusk shows the city in a quieter register than the market streets suggest.

Many of the painter-named streets hold small galleries, record shops and bakeries run by the people who live above them. De Pijp is a neighbourhood first and a destination second, and that is precisely its charm.

The Noord/Zuid metro changed the district. From the station at De Pijp, Centraal is a handful of minutes away and Amsterdam Zuid is two stops south, where trains leave for Schiphol throughout the day. On the surface, trams cover the Ferdinand Bolstraat as well as the Stadhouderskade. By taxi from the airport, count on roughly twenty-five minutes outside the rush.

Seven companions are based here or close by, so a request made in the early evening is often in the room before the kitchen of a neighbourhood restaurant has warmed up. Should you prefer someone from another district, the travel is short: the canal ring and Oud-Zuid begin at the edge of the grid.

Just west, across the Boerenwetering, lies Oud-Zuid with its museums and grand avenues. North of the Stadhouderskade begins Amsterdam Centrum. Both are minutes away, and you are welcome to choose a companion from any district. The hourly structure is set out in the rates.