Astoria is a

Jugendstil (; "Youth Style") was an artistic movement, particularly in the decorative arts, that was influential primarily in Germany, Austria and elsewhere in Europe to a lesser extent from about 1895 until about 1910. It was the German and Austrian cou ...

office building at Keizersgracht 174–176 in

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , ; ; ) is the capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, largest city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It has a population of 933,680 in June 2024 within the city proper, 1,457,018 in the City Re ...

, built in 1904–1905 as the headquarters of the Eerste Hollandsche Levensverzekerings Bank insurance company. The building, at the intersection of the

Keizersgracht The Keizersgracht (; "Emperor's canal") is a canal in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. It is the second of the three main Amsterdam canals that together form the Grachtengordel, or canal belt, and lies between the inner Herengracht and outer Prinseng ...

and

Leliegracht The Leliegracht (; Lily Canal) is a canal in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, between Herengracht (no. 148 and 169) and Prinsengracht (no. 124 and 241). The canal lies within the western Grachtengordel (canal belt) in the Jordaan neighborhood of the A ...

canals Canals or artificial waterways are waterways or engineered channels built for drainage management (e.g. flood control and irrigation) or for conveyancing water transport vehicles (e.g. water taxi). They carry free, calm surface flow u ...

, served as the international headquarters of

Greenpeace Greenpeace is an independent global campaigning network, founded in Canada in 1971 by a group of Environmental movement, environmental activists. Greenpeace states its goal is to "ensure the ability of the Earth to nurture life in all its biod ...

for 15 years. In 2001, it gained ''

rijksmonument A (, ) is a national heritage site of the Netherlands, listed by the agency Rijksdienst voor het Cultureel Erfgoed (RCE) acting for the Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture and Science. At the end of February 2015, the Netherlands had 61,822 l ...

'' (national monument) status.

Description

With six floors and a maximum height of 37 metres, the Astoria building was one of the first office towers in the Netherlands. The building was a design by H.H. Baanders and

Gerrit van Arkel Gerrit A. van Arkel (April 3, 1858 in Loenen aan de Vecht – July 11, 1918 in Abcoude) was a Dutch architect who designed many of Amsterdam's most prominent Jugendstil (Art Nouveau) buildings. He moved to Amsterdam in 1883 to become an architec ...

, two architects who designed many buildings in Amsterdam in a sobre version of Jugendstil which later came to be known as ''Nieuwe Kunst'' ("New Art"). The Astoria building has a copper-plated roof with a small tower and decorative cast-iron fencing with EHLB (for Eerste Hollandsche Levensverzekerings Bank) in gold lettering. The mosaic on the Keizersgracht facade shows a guardian angel (intended to be symbolic of the insurance company) and two other figures. In 1968–1969, the building was extended in the same style, after a design by architect C. Wegener Sleeswijk. Astoria served for 15 years as the international headquarters of

, from the founding of Greenpeace International in 1989. The building now houses various companies. The Astoria building is on the same block as the

Anne Frank House The Anne Frank House () is a writer's house and biographical museum dedicated to Judaism, Jewish wartime diarist Anne Frank. The building is located on a canal called the Prinsengracht, close to the Westerkerk, in Amsterdam-Centrum, central Amst ...

Sources

Amsterdam Bureau Monumenten & Archeologie
(Dutch)
Astoria, Keizersgracht 174-176
(En) {{Authority control Greenpeace Rijksmonuments in Amsterdam Art Nouveau architecture in Amsterdam Office buildings completed in 1905 Headquarters in the Netherlands Art Nouveau commercial buildings 1905 establishments in the Netherlands 20th-century architecture in the Netherlands