Sir Albert - Amsterdam

‘Lady Smith’. She rolled the words around her mouth like an especially succulent sherry. ‘LADY Smith.’ Mrs Smith – or ‘Lady’, as she was now styling herself – had placed herself within the so-called ‘study’ area of Amsterdam’s lively and smart new hotel, the Sir Albert, and she was lolling on a sofa, drink in hand and aristocratic attitude newly acquired. I quaked, slightly, but soon recovered myself enough to remember my consort duties.

We had arrived not five minutes before, bedraggled and weary from the evening rain and a missed tram stop. A welcome glass of reviving prosecco and the truest sense of noblesse oblige we’d ever encountered had revived Lady Smith, who was now looking around her with a sense of rapture, and just a soupçon (or Verdenking in local parlance) of entitlement. We’d been impressed by a sign on the side of the building which bears the enormous Disraeli quote: ‘Like all great travellers, I have seen more than I remember, and I remember more than I have seen.’ Our aim was to see much, and remember more.

Thankfully, Sir Albert gave us plenty to cherish. Opened in 2012 in the fashionable De Pijp area of town, and situated in what used to be a diamond factory, it’s a rhapsody in comfort, luxury and space, treating every customer as as though they were to the manor born. A walk around its stylish, black-painted corridors threw up stylish curiosities, such as a case of medical implements; the overall effect makes you feel as though you are staying with a wealthy and flamboyantly eccentric uncle. Other buildings might rattle when trams pass, but not Sir Albert – to avoid costly mistakes by the factory workers as they cut gems, the building was fully fortified. It's intimate inside and you'll never guess there are 90 bedrooms. Nor that it's a hotel, thanks to the deliberately discreet reception area. Sir Albert wants you to feel like an aristocrat in his fine city; you'll want to share a cigar or two with this fine gentleman. It might have taken us a few minutes to discover the sophisticated lighting system, but once we’d mastered the intricacies of inserting electronic room keys in just the right slot, we were away. In our deluxe room we were free to discover the comforts of the enormous, palatial bed – one fit for a king and queen, not just their courtiers.

After an excellent breakfast in the stylish, Japanese Izakaya restaurant the next day, Lady Smith, an Amsterdam virgin, demanded a tour of the city’s cultural highlights. I was happy to oblige. The sun having deigned to emerge, we sauntered in lordly fashion along the obligatory canal for a few moments until we found ourselves at the Rijksmuseum, newly reopened after a decade-long refurbishment. The Museum of the Netherlands boasts a formidable assembly of world-class art, most notably Rembrandt’s The Night Watch. But being simple creatures, Lady Smith and I particularly enjoyed the display of 17th-century Dutch drinking horns. They all promised a combination of temporary joy and lasting hangovers. Many of the paintings around showed the effect of these drinking horns; whether intended as a cautionary tale or an ode to joy, those in them seemed to be having the most tremendous time. I saw a smile creep across Lady Smith’s lips. A glass would be had tonight, it seemed.

All this art admiration is thirsty work, and so we made Lion Noir on hip Reguliersdwarsstraatwe our next stop. There we had a sumptuous dinner that disproved that the old adage about Dutch cuisine being tired and consisting mainly of potatoes. My main course of excellent beef fillet did contain a small Jersey Royal, but I got the impression that this was intended as an ironic reference to the country’s unimpressive cooking in the past.

A stroll round the canals afterwards and occasional views of ladies of the night disporting themselves in briefs in their windows for the Amsterdam first-timer. And thence to Sir Albert via a pit stop at the nearby Café Gollem on Raamsteeg. I’d been looking forward to this. Boasting a stellar range of beers at (relatively) low prices, this superb bar also has a reputation for friendliness and unpretentiousness, so much so that, within an hour or so, we’d made friends with the bar staff, who professed an admiration for English cider, and were getting pleasantly relaxed on a fine Belgian beer called Kwak: an homage to the craic inspires?

When one of Café Gollem’s staff broke off to tend to a dark-haired woman in the corner. She was clearly a known quantity – a regular, perhaps? The bartender returned, grinning. ‘Are you familiar with Carice van Houten in England?’ Lady Smith and I both nodded. Game Of Thrones has long been a topic of conversation in our house. ‘Oh, she’s just up there in that corner. Comes in all the time.’ Little sums up the difference between England and Amsterdam better. Should Britain’s most famous actress come into the average bar, they would be bothered until they had to flee. In Amsterdam, it’s a fact barely worth remarking on. It’s this civilised, egalitarian and open-minded way of life that reminded us, as we took our eventual leave, that everyone here’s an aristocrat, not just the denizens of Sir Albert. Everyone, that is, apart from the bearded and stoned man who took a liking to Lady Smith. But that’s a story for another day…