Category: The Hague

Opening 2009 Holland Dance Festival

Dance Outside awaiting Public at Holland Dance Festival P1050356

A lonely dancer is outside to welcome the public for the opening of Holland Dance Festival.

The 2009 festival is entirely dedicated to the Netherlands Dance Theater‘s 50ieth anniversary and Jiri Kilian’s departure as the resident choreographer of NDT in The Hague.

Holland-Dance-Festival-President-of-the-Board-of-Trustees-P1050369a

The president of the Board of Trustees of Holland Dance Festifal, Mr Gilbert Monod de Froideville welcomed the public.

Minister Plasterk Opens Holland Dance Festival officially P1050366

Dutch Minister of Culture, R. Plasterk opens Holland Dance Festival officially.

I’m sorry the photos are not as sharp as I would have liked.

To be continued.

Helping to save Panorama Mesdag?

clipped from www.denhaag.nl

News
€ 10,000 to save Panorama Mesdag

Adopting a piece of painting

  • Published: 13 October 2009
  • Modified: 27 October 2009

Deputy Mayor Marieke Bolle handed over a cheque for € 10,000 to Panorama Mesdag on 29 September on behalf of The Hague Municipal Executive. She did this to kick off the public campaign ‘Save Panorama Mesdag’ in The Hague.
In the coming time Panorama Mesdag is trying to collect as much money as possible in order to finance the museum’s urgently-needed renovation and maintenance project.
The museum is launching a campaign to save H.W. Mesdag’s gigantic panorama of Scheveningen at the end of the 19th century. Without financial support, the museum may be forced to close.

How you can help
On the special website Red Panorama Mesdag, you can become a donor for as little as € 5 (€ 5 to € 500) or you can adopt one or more sections of this beautiful painting (starting at € 1,000).
Don’t let the curtain fall. Save Panorama Mesdag!
This is a quick clip which I ill enhance with some comments later

Here are my observations: (added October 28, 13.30 hr)

  1. I’m really glad the The Hague City Council offers peace to Panorama Mesdag in this form.
  2. However, the City Council is partly to blame for the financial problems of Panorama Mesdag, since it appears there was insufficient supervision by the City Council when Hilton started building an underground parking garage very next to the Panorama building. That caused damage to the Panorama building. Panorama Mesdag has been fighting a long and costly uphill legal battle against the building permit and the building process itself and now finds itself in a situation where it has to structurally enhance the Panorama building…
  3. At least I would expect Hilton to match this gesture of the The Hague City Counsel….
  4. Note the new lay out of the The Hague website.

Proud 2010 Gault Millau Hotelier

Gault Millau 2010 sticker for Haagsche Suites

Yesterday, as the first of the 5 or 6 prestigious restaurant guides in The Netherlands, the Dutch version of the Gault Millau Guide presented its 2010 awards and 2010 guide with the best 500 and something Restaurants and best 220 Hotels of The Netherlands here around the corner in The Hague. I’m a bit sad I had to miss the ceremony…so near by.

Today I received the sticker proving the Gault Millau editors deem Haagsche Suites worthy to belong to the best 220 Dutch Hotels in their guide. Thank you Gault Millau for the quick service, that even beats the new listings on your own website 🙂

Gault Millau started in France as a restaurant guide in 1969. It was founded by two restaurant critics, Henri Gault (1929-2000) and Christian Millau. The French site is a mere window for their paper guide.

Yesterday the Belgian and Luxemburg Branche of Gault Millau also presented its 2010 Guide and awards.

I grabbed the following from the Misset Horeca Site:

Plaese note the best restaurant has been awarded 20 points out of 20 which is remarkable in the Gault Millau history. At the same time our Belgian neighbors awarded a Dutchman, Roger van Damme the Chef of the year award for his Antwerp based lunches only restaurant.

Gault Millau’s top 13 Restaurants of The Netherlands:

Points Restaurant City
20 Oud Sluis Sluis
19,5 Inter Scaldes Kruiningen
19,5 Beluga Maastricht
19,5 De Librije Zwolle
19 De Leest Vaassen
18 La Rive Amstel Hotel Amsterdam
18 Chalet Royal Den Bosch
18 De Lindenhof Giethoorn
18 De Bokkedoorns Overveen
18 Parkheuvel Rotterdam
18 De Zwethheul Schipluiden
18 De Leuf Ubachsberg
18 ‘t Brouwerskolkje Overveen



gaultmillau 2010 logo
Two of those top restaurants, Parkheuvel and De Zwetheul are easy to reach for a dinner when staying in Haagsche Suites.

Two other Restaurants Calla’s and Seinpost who also earned good points are even nearer to Haagsche Suites. Seinpost has the best wine food combining sommelier of 2010.

Austria, Italy, Germany and Switzerland each have their own Gault Millau guides.The US and the UK have their Gayot guides. Gayot was a friend of Gault and Millau and they published joint guides until a schism in 2000.

Gault Millau is said to be the guide of the food purists more than the Guide Michelin….

Nominated for the Dutch Bloggies with Two Blogs!

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Because I’m writing my blogs in the English Language – the Dutch Bloggies site is entirely in the Dutch Language – and only about 7% of the readers of Happy Hotelier originate from the Netherlands, I never anticipated any ranking in the Dutch Bloggies Award.

So you can imagine that I’m quite amazed (and a bit proud) the Dutch Bloggies jury has deemed it worthy to nominate not only this blog, but also my significant other blog Chair Blog among 300 blogs for the public voting round of the Dutch Bloggies Award.

As of the moment of publishing this there are only 11 more hours before the public voting round of this week closes and 20 of the 300 nominated blogs will enter the final round.

If you like you can vote here.

Time permitting I will be covering the Award Ceremony as that will take place in The Hague, The Hague being an official Sponsor of the venue.

On my bike to TodaysArt 2009 (#TA09)

20090925 On-my-Bike-underway-to-#TA09-_MG_1277a
The Big Church of The Hague

Yesterday, like today, it was gorgeous weather. Around 06.00 PM I jumped on my bike (yes, sometimes I do bike) to visit the TodaysArt festival in The Hague City Center. From my bike I took this photo of the Big Church of The Hague and you can see how crisp the air was.
Maison-de-Bonneterie-in-The-Hague-Centre-_MG_1279
Maison de Bonneterie, A fashion temple right in the The Hague City Center shopping area.
Spuiplein-just-before-the-start-of-TodaysArt-2009-_MG_1280
I arrived at Spuiplein, the center of TodaysArt festival just before it taking off.

Spuiplein is the huge square next to The Hague Town Hall and in front of the music hall (the building with the red triangle) named after Anton Philips. The Lucent Dance Theater is adjacent to Anton Phillips Hall and to its right. The two buildings in the back are Dutch Government offices and the blue building to the right is the The Hague Mercure hotel.