Amsterdamers - Episode #4
The Hotelier, Otto Nan
Otto took a beautiful old building, with an extraordinary history and turned it into an amazing hotel.
In Otto Nan’s own words: My name is Otto Nan. I am the managing director of the Lloyd Hotel and Cultural Embassy in Amsterdam. It is the place where we are now and I am best known for being an entrepreneur with cultural interest. Culture is in our veins and that is what we try to show here. We mix the commercial with the culture in beautiful places. We try to infuse culture into the look and feel of the hotel by having a studio in the hotel. From here we can set new things in motion. This is a new place for creative minds to express themselves. It is a building that is no longer in use, in the eastern Docklands.
There has been a lot of development here, which made the government interested in somebody who could do something beautiful here. Something that would differ from the monotonic approach of the other developments.
What book would you recommend as a must-read? It would be, ‘The Life Of Pi’ written by Yann Martel. It is about a man who is in a shipwreck and then he is floating for days, weeks, years and in the end, I think it’s beautiful because, in the end, you think maybe it’s just one trip and also it sort of a metaphor for living and floating. You can do a bit, but much of your life experience is out of your hands. I think it’s like a beautiful fairy tale. A sort of adventure but also a sort of mind fuck. I guess there are many parallels with the hotel. But I think the whole life is a big adventure.
What music would you recommend the world listens to? It would be The Sinner, the Depeche Mode song but then the remix by Ricardo Villalobos. Originally it’s a very gloomy song. And Ricardo Villalobos turns it into a beautiful piece, cheerful but still serious. In his hands, it becomes very light and it’s very uplifting. He introduces the opposite of the song’s original intention, and it’s amazing.
Who would you say is the most interesting person, and why? That would be Kostijn Egberts. He owns a record label, and he manages one of the most interesting bands in Holland called Le Le and De Jeugd van Tegenworodig. They juggle language and hip-hop and it is interesting.
Amsterdamers episode 7 – The Photographer, Ruud van der Peijl
Amsterdamers episode 6 – The DJ, Joost van Bellen
Amsterdamers episode 5 – The Manager, Kostijn Egberts