A hall built for machines

The Hamerkwartier in Amsterdam-Noord was never meant to be pretty. At the start of the twentieth century this stretch of the IJ was one long row of factories, shipyards and warehouses, and one of the biggest names here was Stork. The engineering firm from Hengelo had merged with Werkspoor, Amsterdam’s own machine builder, and in the halls along the Hamerkanaal they built heavy machinery for sugar plantations in Suriname and Ethiopia, engines and kitchen equipment for ships, and the kind of industrial hardware that made the port run.

By the end of the century most of it was gone. The big factory buildings were replaced by housing and business premises, and the hall at Gedempt Hamerkanaal 201 stood empty, its windows set high in the walls so that nobody on the floor could be distracted by the view of the water outside.

Opening the walls

In 2011 the housing corporation Eigen Haard commissioned CUBE architecten and SOLUZ to redevelop around 30,000 square metres of this industrial complex into a new neighbourhood for creative companies, restaurants, events and culture. They called it De Overkant, the other side, which is how Amsterdammers have always referred to Noord. Restaurant STORK was one of the pioneers.

The architects did something restrained and clever. They kept the enormous industrial space intact and cut large openings into the facade, closed with glass folding doors, so that the hall finally opened onto the IJ. All the kitchens, bars and facilities were put behind one long wall that stops short of the facade and the roof, so the new additions read like furniture inside the old hall rather than a renovation of it. Old factory parts, cable reels, fixtures, were reused in the interior. The result is a room that still feels like it is waiting for a crane to swing overhead.

The largest seafood restaurant in the city, for a while

STORK called itself Amsterdam’s largest seafood restaurant, and when you stood in the middle of the room you believed it. Oysters, sea bass, swordfish and lobster came out of the oven, the terrace along the water was one of the biggest in the city, and on a summer evening the view across the IJ was the kind of thing visitors photographed and locals pretended not to notice. A short ride on the free ferry from the back of Central Station, which mattered more than you would think when you were moving five hundred people.

The DJ on the terrace of STORK during ABN AMRO's Haring Party

Five hundred guests and a Dutch tradition

That was the number we worked with for ABN AMRO’s Haring Party, the annual celebration of the first herring of the season, which we delivered for two editions at STORK. The brief: an iconic, unmistakably Dutch afternoon by the water for 500 guests, without it becoming a cliché. So we leaned into the tradition and gave it a stage. DJ performances. Thematic Dutch decor. Signature hospitality, with the Haring Ladies and Gentlemen serving fresh herring in true local style.

The building did most of the work. A venue with that much character does not need to be dressed up; it needs someone who knows what to leave alone and where to add the one layer that makes it feel like an occasion. Our role was the invisible one: capacity planning, flow between terrace and hall, timing of the herring, the DJs and the speeches, and the hundred small things that make 500 guests feel looked after.

What came next

Restaurant STORK has since closed; most guides now list it as permanently closed, and the Amsterdam restaurant guide Barts Boekje reports that the hall at Gedempt Hamerkanaal 201 has been taken over by Kade Noord, a small food hall with five stands run by the team behind Bon Burger Bar, REM and Mata Hari. We have not hosted an event there yet, so we will not pretend to know it. What we do know is the building, the water and the neighbourhood: the Hamerkwartier keeps reinventing itself, and a herring party on the IJ is still one of the best ideas a company can have in June. If you want one, ask us where the right hall is now.