The Best Design Stores in Amsterdam

Droog has amassed a large international following over the years, thanks to their outstanding collaborations with several leading designers. Their simple, yet ingenious products frequently bear a subtle hint of humour and often repurpose found materials into new, clever designs. Many of Droog’s products are now recognised as iconic, including items like Marcel Wanders’ ‘Knotted Chair’ or Tejo Remy’s ‘Chest of Drawers’. The studio is still active and has a charming showroom on Staalstraat called Hôtel Droog.

The creators of this effortlessly cool chain of department stores certainly know their clientele and market their products as ‘urban essentials’. Besides its superbly curated collection, Hutspot’s headquarters in de Pijp also features an excellent lunchroom, café, and barbershop, making it exceptionally easy to spend an entire afternoon chilling inside the store. In order to stay on-trend Hutspot constantly updates its catalogue with new products from up-and-coming international brands.

Concrete Matter’s unique collection gravitates around useful, durable products that are designed to outlive their owners. The store exclusively stocks timeless items that are made to withstand years of wear-and-tear, such as high-grade pocket-knifes, stainless steel flasks, or sturdy flannel shirts. Apart from these indispensable items, Concrete Matter also sells high-end lifestyle products that are geared towards modern men, including artisanal beard creams and awesome old-school collectibles.

Otherwise known as This Is The Shit, T.I.T.S. always goes the extra mile when it comes to fashion and curates an enduringly awesome collection of accessories, clothing and lifestyle products. The store constantly seeks out new, fresh items to add to their wardrobe and works with a number of hard-hitting, contemporary brands. For obvious reasons, T.I.T.S’ branded t-shirts are madly popular in Amsterdam.

This 19th-century throwback collects specimens and trinkets that wouldn’t look out of place inside a Victorian curiosity cabinet. These peculiar, outlandish and often outright spectacular items are all endowed with a deeply refined sense of elegance that perfectly matches the store’s stylish aesthetic. As the store’s diverse catalogue includes exotic taxidermic specimens, mounted butterflies and archaic, handmade jewellery, shoppers can always expect a surprise at The Otherist.

Despite the growing prestige that surrounds HEMA abroad, the stores are actually rather ubiquitous in the Netherlands. They are, nonetheless, exceptionally well-stocked with a wide range of affordable products that are almost, always created by in-house designers. In fact, HEMA often teams up with young Dutch craftspeople in order to produce, new and interesting items or clothing lines. Their rookworst is also spectacular. HEMA can be found in locations across Amsterdam.