PUT OFF THE RED LIGHT
Amsterdam’s red light district is cleaning up its act, and windows once filled with prostitutes now feature the latest fashions. But will the city lose the louche glamour that made it famous?
Text: Massimo Benvegnù
Photo: RVDA
Apair of shapely female legs on display is not an unusual sight in De Wallen, Amsterdam’s famous red light district. Unless, that is, they belong to a fashion mannequin, rather than one of the hundreds of real women who stand inside full-length shop windows, hoping to attract customers for their very personal services. But, all irony aside, using mannequins to replace prostitutes is one of the ways that Job Cohen, the city’s mayor since 2001, is hoping to realise his long-cherished plans to clean up Amsterdam’s most notorious area.
Mayor Cohen has launched Project 1012 — its name taken from the local post code — to rebrand De Wallen. As part of its efforts, the city council recently bought 18 “windows” — the shop-like units where sex workers show themselves off to punters and curious passers-by — and handed them over to young Dutch fashion designers to be transformed into studio spaces.
Red Light Fashion, as the initiative is known, began on 19 January this year in conjunction with the Amsterdam Fashion Week, and Project 1012 wants it to continue for at least a year. The designers — who include up-and-coming couturier Jan Taminiau and the enfant terrible of Amsterdam street fashion, Bas Kosters — will not be charged any rent for these storefronts, in which they will be able to display their creations in this hugely popular tourist area. But will visitors to Amsterdam — estimated at around 10 million per year — still be drawn to De Wallen if the edgiest thing on show is adventurous clothing designs?
Leading Dutch designers will take part in the Red Light Fashion initiative, replacing brass with class
“They come to Amsterdam in such great numbers to see the red light district and everything around there,” says Wim Boef from Platform 1012, a local group which is fighting Mayor Cohen’s initiative, “and I think that if the authorities keep closing the windows, people won’t come en masse any more. Now they’re also planning to revoke the licences of places like the [strip clubs] Casa Rosso and the Banana Bar, and the city council’s message seems clear to me: they want to kill off the red light district.”
“Our intentions are clear,” responds Lodewijk Asscher, a city councillor and strong supporter of Mayor Cohen’s plans, “we want one of the most prestigious areas of our city, right in the historic centre, to be restructured and converted to a new use. We want to open new restaurants, hotels, bars and shops for tourists. Our inspiration is Rudy Giuliani’s New York. When he started work, drug trafficking and illegal prostitution disappeared from Times Square, the area was cleaned up and the number of tourists visiting the city of New York has gone up.”
Mariska Majoor runs the Prostitutie Informatie Centrum, an association which promotes the welfare of women who work in the district.
She first jokes about the initiative — “They’ve taken down the girls so they can put up sexy mannequins?” — but then gets serious, saying that the mayor should be more concerned about protecting sex workers.
Will Amsterdam lose its risqué allure if prostitution
is pushed out of tourist areas?
So the battle lines are drawn between the forces of regeneration and the sex industry. In other cities this would be a little local difficulty that would not attract much attention. But such is the fame of the red light district that the media have begun to suggest that Amsterdam is closing its windows and that it has irretrievably lost the sense of transgression which made it famous.
But Mayor Cohen’s real priority is to limit activities in De Wallen that have potential criminal connections: money laundering, illegal immigration, drug dealing. He has made it clear that he does not want a complete ban on prostitution, which has been tolerated in the Netherlands for years and was formally legalised in 2000. His aim is to regulate it.
Like all urban regeneration projects, Project 1012 has a long time scale and is only due for completion in 2017. Even if it is successful, there will always be an area of central Amsterdam — like the group of roads and alleyways running from Oude Nieuwstraat to Oudezijds Achterburgwal — that will continue to act as a red light district.
While 18 windows in De Wallen are now being used to sell fashion, there are still more than 400 windows being used to sell sex. And that should be more than enough to meet most tourists’ expectations.
IN AND AROUND DE WALLEN
Eat: The red light district is right next to Amsterdam’s Chinatown. Hoi Tin (Zeedijk 122-124, tel: +31 (0)20 625 6451) serves authentic and delicious Cantonese-style dishes at very reasonable prices.
Drink: For a real change of pace from the bustling streets, take refuge in Himalaya (Warmoesstraat 56, tel: +31 (0)20 626 0899, www..himalaya.nl), a serene new age tea house just a stone’s throw away from De Wallen.
Stay: The Grand Amsterdam (Oudezijds Voorburgwal 197, tel: +31 (0)20 555 3111, www..thegrand.nl), offers all the modern conveniences you would expect from a luxury hotel in a beautiful historic building that was used as the setting for the royal wedding of Queen Beatrix in 1966.
See: The Magnum Photos 60 Years exhibition continues until 12 May at Amsterdam’s Contemporary Art Museum (Stedelijk Museum, Oosterdokskade 5, tel: +31 (0)20 5732 911, www.stedelijk.nl), with many of the images that made the photographic agency so famous.
Buy: If you want to pick up some typical Dutch dairy products, look no further than the Alexander cheese shop (Nieuwmarkt 6, tel: +31 (0)20 639 3559) which also stocks a range of cooked meats.
Netherlands Tourism Office: www.holland.com