A'DAM Lookout

For decades, this 22-story tower was the corporate headquarters of Royal Dutch Shell, and nobody except oil company employees ever saw the view from the top. The building opened in 1971 as the Shell Overhoeks Tower, designed by architect Arthur Staal, and it dominated the north bank of the IJ river like a concrete monument to fossil fuels. When Shell moved out in 2003, the tower sat empty, and the city spent years figuring out what to do with it.

The answer was A'DAM — short for Amsterdam Dance and Music. The tower was gutted and reimagined as a creative hub: a boutique hotel, a revolving restaurant, recording studios, co-working spaces, a nightclub on the ground floor, and the observation deck on top that draws tourists by the thousands. The rooftop swing — "Over the Edge" — lets visitors swing out over the building's edge at 100 meters above the ground, which is either thrilling or terrifying depending on your relationship with heights.

The panoramic view from the observation deck is arguably the best in Amsterdam. You can see the entire city laid out below: the canal belt radiating outward from Dam Square, the green rectangle of Vondelpark, the harbor, the polders stretching toward the horizon. On clear days you can see all the way to the dunes at the coast.

The transformation of this side of the IJ tells Amsterdam's recent story in miniature. What was once an industrial backwater is now a booming cultural district, anchored by the A'DAM Tower and the EYE Film Museum across the plaza. Take the free ferry from behind Centraal Station — the crossing takes five minutes and gives you the best approach view of the Amsterdam skyline.