For affordable luxury

THE COLLEGE

It’s a college on two counts. Just five months old, the hotel was formerly a place of learning (economics), but it is now run by students from the city’s hotel training school, under the guidance of a professional management team. Despite the L-plates, it all works seamlessly (although you might want to avoid the first week of September, when the new intake begins its practicals).

The late-19th-century building is an architectural triumph of ornate brickwork. Located in elegant Amsterdam South, near the Rijksmuseum, the Van Gogh museum and the smart stores of PC Hooftstraat, the College has 40 sumptuous and individually designed rooms, most with enormous windows overlooking a quiet bricked and pebbled courtyard.

There’s a lively bar and a restaurant with an open kitchen, again the domain of students, serving modern — and, thankfully, lighter — variations on traditional Dutch dishes. A five-course extravaganza will set you back £35.

Doubles from £143, room-only; 00 31 20 571 1511, www.thecollegehotel.com

For quirky character

THE LLOYD

There’s nowhere quite like the Lloyd hotel. Jointly created by a lawyer, a doctor/cook, an art curator and an underground party organiser, it opened a year ago in the run-down/born-again eastern docklands, converted from a huge, rather severe 1920s listed waterfront building, built to house migrants en route from eastern Europe to the Americas.

It is a brilliant work of reinvention and full of creative surprises — baths, and even showers, in the middle of some of the 116 bedrooms, one with a 12ft-wide bed, another with a grand piano. A mobile recording studio will be available from early 2006. The Lloyd also breaks new ground in hospitality by offering a choice of one- to five-star room options, the former with shared bathrooms (towelling robes are provided for middle-of-the-night calls). Other facilities include a restaurant (Snel, meaning brisk), a shop for groceries if you want to picnic in the room and a superb library of art books, as well as space for visiting artists.

Doubles from £55, £68, £96, £123 or £191, according to stars; 00 31 20 561 3636, www.lloydhotel.com

For pure romance

SEVEN ONE SEVEN

Guesthouses come no more sumptuous than this. Home to the late fashion designer Kees van der Valk, the 19th-century canal house has been lavishly embellished with treasures acquired on his global travels, as well as antiques, oils and contemporary artworks, all assembled with exquisite taste.

The eight bedrooms are snuggle-perfect roosts that will fast-track anyone’s calendar to February 14. If you do decide to venture out of the bedroom, you will find curl-up-on sofas, lots of candles and real log fires in the living rooms.

The Seven One Seven also has a library and a breakfast room with grand piano, with a patio shaded by an old maple tree for alfresco eggs or afternoon tea.

Rooms lead off the narrow, twisting staircase in the main house and include two enormous suites overlooking the canal. Despite their front-of-house position, they are perfectly tranquil.

Doubles £277-£451, including breakfast, afternoon tea, wine, beer and soft drinks (check the website for special offers); 00 31 20 427 0717, www.717hotel.nl

For big spenders

THE GRAND

Grand by name, grand by nature, the top hotel in town is a skip away from Dam Square. Aside from a shower of stars, you get a full helping of heritage; the building, a blend of architectural styles, began as a convent (14th century), then became a royal lodging house (16th), then the Dutch Admiralty (17th) and, until 1988, Amsterdam’s City Hall. When the bureaucrats moved out, millions were spent on a caring renovation — check out the still functioning Marriage Chamber, decorated with splendid art-deco murals, and the stained-glass windows that run the full height of the main staircase.

For your money — a lot — you get old-school service, an Albert Roux restaurant housed in the old canteen, a microscopic gym, a sauna, an indoor pool and an oasis of a courtyard garden. And what are the 182 rooms like? Spacious, with smart but unmemorable fabrics and furnishings that are straight from the props room of five-star central casting.

Doubles from £287, rising to £1,020 for the Royal suite, room-only; 00 31 20 555 3111, www.thegrand.nl

For tight budgets

HOTEL WIECHMANN

A three-generation Dutch-American family affair with 37 rooms, including triples and quads (so ideal for families) spreads like a warren through three canalside houses. One in three rooms has canal views — and these are worth the extra — the best being the six corner rooms with windows on both Prinsengracht and Looersgracht. The rest peer peacefully into an inner space between the buildings. There’s also a bright and cheerful breakfast room, which used to be a pub.

There’s nothing fancy about the Wiechmann. The rooms are simply furnished, with an eye to function rather than style, purse rather than pleasure, but you do get a happy ship and a prime location. The hotel borders Jordaan, a former working-class district that comes amply stocked with cosy brown cafes and funky, Noddy-size shops. The Looier antiques market (open daily except Fridays) is just around the corner.

Doubles from £85, B&B; 00 31 20 626 3321, www.hotelwiechmann.nl (note that the hotel is due to close for three months this winter)

Fine, but how do I get there?

Amsterdam is well served from both the UK and Ireland. KLM (0870 507 4074, www.klm.com) flies from 15 UK airports, including Aberdeen, Birmingham, Bristol, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Heathrow, Humberside, Leeds, London City, Manchester, Newcastle and Southampton, and from Dublin; EasyJet (0905 821 0905, 65p/min; www.easyjet.com) flies from Belfast, Bristol, Edinburgh,Gatwick, Glasgow, Liverpool, Luton and Stansted; VLM (020 7476 6677, www.flyvlm.com) flies from London City; BA (0870 850 9850, www.ba.com) flies from Gatwick and Heathrow; Jet2 (0871 226 1737, www.jet2.com) flies from Leeds and Manchester; BMI (0870 607 0555, www.flybmi.com) flies from Heathrow; BMI Baby (0870 264 2229, www.bmibaby.com) flies from Birmingham and Nottingham/ East Midlands; Thomsonfly (0870 190 0737, www.thomsonfly.com) flies from Bournemouth, Coventry and Doncaster/Sheffield; and Aer Lingus (0845 084 4444, www.aerlingus.com) flies from Cork and Dublin.

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