#ParkthatPhone in your Mobile Parking Lot

14-7-2015

A Mobile Parking Lot: a semi new non-tech invention to spice up your meeting room! At Mobileparkinglot.tumblr.com you can download different designs, all free of charge. Great initiative by Christiano Neves and Fernando Barbella.

It might be because of my grey hair but I’m always looking for either my wallet, keys or my phone! When it takes a long time to find any of these items, I always think that I have to create a spot to leave them. That’s just what Mobile Parking Lot did! They created a gimmick to freely spice up your meeting room. No more phone distractions, just ask your meeting partners in a humorous way to park their phone in your Mobile Parking Lot.

Your Mobile Parking Lot

Mobile Parking Lot gets rid of device distractions during the day and ensures that all eyes are on you during a meeting. Christiano Neves and Fernando Barbella created this non-tech device while they worked and lived in London. They believe that the success of meetings is determined by actively being involved in the meeting without being distracted by mobile phones. To overcome this distraction problem, they created the Mobile Parking Lot, where all mobile phones should be parked before a meeting. #ParkthatPhone at the door and get your mind focused. You can download them for free and start using them at the office, a meeting room or at home, like I will! ^Marjolein

Superfast dinners in a giant jukebox during the funfair

13-7-2015

Ibiza Restaurant in Tilburg (The Netherlands) turns its façade temporarily into a giant jukebox during the most famous funfair in the Netherlands.

Superfast dinners

Restaurant Ibiza lies at the fairground and at any day of the funfair the public can enjoy a delicious dinner at a number of fixed times. Dinner will take no more than one hour, guests don’t want to lose too much time! The meals in the jukebox are accompanied by musical entertainment. The giant jukebox will be on the ‘Heuvelring’ in Tilburg from 17 July to 26 July. Tickets are available through the website and range in price from € 19.99 to € 29.99 for a meal and two drinks.

Inspiration from the funfair in Tilburg

Tempting your guests with a great meal, served within the hour and a special entrance and music … Ibiza restaurant becomes part of the fair. A great way to approach their potential guests. What happens nearby your restaurant this summer? Anything you could anticipate on at an original manner? What would generate a lot of free publicity in advance and a lot of extra guests at the event? Restaurant Ibiza really understands the guests that are coming to the funfair, they love theatrical gestures, a good dinner and they need a lot of time to enjoy the amusement rides!

Playground CS is a pop-up beach opposite to Amsterdam Central Station

10-7-2015

A pop-up beach for young families with children opens opposite to Amsterdam Central Station on 15 July. For six weeks, the former construction site of the North / South metro line will be a pleasant and safe place to play.

Playground CS

The pop-up beach is named ‘Playground CS’ and will be located at the Prins Hendrikkade. The beach will be ​​over 1500 square meters and approximately 250m3 sand is shipped to the spot from the former World Cup beach volleyball court at the Dam square.

Initiative

Playground CS is an initiative of a group of entrepreneurs and is supported by the municipality of Amsterdam. The project is part of the ‘City in Balace’ program, which experiments to find a healthy balance between the growth of Amsterdam and the city life in clever ways. The project is conducted in collaboration with Tosti Creative and Amsterdam Verbindt.

Program

Creative and sporty activities will take place on the beach every day for six weeks starting from 15 July onwards. Children can join activities like jeu des boules, a sand castle contest, child yoga, painting courses or an outdoor movie night. Although the initiative is mainly focused on children, it should be a nice place for parents and local residents as well. Adults can participate in tai chi or yoga classes in the morning, or start their day with a coffee and a newspaper in the sun. Cold drinks and snacks are for sale in a shipping container on the premises. More information about the project and its programming will be available on the Playground CS website.

Co-founder Joost Aartsen (Tosti Creative): “We hope to see five hundred happy faces daily at this exceptional location. It’s great that the municipality supports this initiative and wants to realize the project with ambitious entrepreneurs. The goal of this project is to form an Amsterdam collective to get the city in motion together. Anyone with good ideas is welcome to contribute.”

Antwerp’s urban park: Summer Josephine’s

10-7-2015

This summer it’s already the second edition of the Summer Josephine’s, an urban park in Antwerp. The storage areas of City Brewery De Koninck are this summer the place to enjoy summer cocktails, specialty beers, fine food and a nice atmosphere again. Owner Kasper Stuart created a great space here to escape the hectic pace of the city life.

Daily summer festival

There is a central ordering caravan where you buy drink tickets and order food. there is a gourmet restaurant as well. The meat is purchased locally and cooked on the Big Green Egg or Mibrasa-wood oven. They also serve fish and vegetarian dishes.

Responsible for the design with a high vintage feeling is Designer Not Before Ten, this company is, among others, responsible for the design of Balls & Glory Antwerp & Ghent, The Brewery De Halve Maan (The crescent) in Bruges and Club La Rocca in Lier.

In the area of Summer Josephine’s, which is reached by a long hallway where you can enjoy graffiti by famous graffiti artists, you’ll find plenty of eye-catchers. Like, pallet constructions, vintage sofas, old-fashioned lampshades and second-hand accessories. And have a look at the beach chairs, a sandbox for the kids and picnic benches.

Inspiration: special cocktail evenings at Summer Josephine’s

Kasper Stuart also organizes special evenings around :Pimm’s Cup, one of our favorite cocktails. But also around the Cointreau Fizz. With a special cart for the Pimm’s Cup and a Cointreau Fizz bike on the site. Fun for a large summer terrace!

Affordable quality in cosy and casual restaurant Jack Dish

10-7-2015

Restaurant Jack Dish opened at the Stadionplein in Amsterdam on 7 July.
Sometimes you stumble upon something and everything seems to fit in. After a spontaneous visit to the unfortunately fully booked BautZuid, a round at the major construction site of the Stadionplein in Amsterdam didn’t gave much hope for another proper cosy and casual dining place. Until we spotted Jack Dish. At first glance, a small cafe, but once inside it was visible that the restaurant consist of two rooms. Add a huge terrace to that, and you have a restaurant that can feed many mouths and steel as many hearts this summer.

Affordable quality

With a cosy interior, a lot of plants and a half open kitchen, the restaurant is decorated with a fine touch. The Facebook page gives an impression of the recent renovations of the restaurant. The high kitchen counter is the best spot in our opinion. There you are at eye level with the enthusiastic former chefs of Restaurant Braque who are already nicely attuned with each other and the equipment (including a Big Green Egg). Restaurant Braque got a 10- by late Johannes van Dam (famous Dutch food critic) in 2010 and restaurant Jack Dish continues the aim for affordable, high quality and tasty food.

Holy Günter

The menu offers various main courses such as chicken, salmon, eggplant (vega) and rib-eye. Although the rib-eye unfortunately was sold out, the pain was eased by a drink on the house. The crowd was relatively young and was merely from the neighbourhood, which made it a fine casual atmosphere with congratulations, greetings and smiling faces all around. With crispy fries and a variety of specialty beers, of which Holy Günter is my absolute favorite, this restaurant will provide a lasting boost to the Stadionplein. ^Armand Sol

Inflatables Festival for adults only in Amsterdam

9-7-2015

On 29 and 30 August, the first inflatables festival of The Netherlands is organized in Amsterdam.

From ball pit to inflatables festival

Because ball pits and inflatables are popular at festivals, Michael Döbelman and Bob Wisman (party organization ‘Dagverblijf’, freely translated as ‘Day Care’) came up with the idea to organize an inflatables festival. After overwhelming and positive responses online, they have decided to actually organize it. On 29 and 30 August there will be 2.000 visitors a day in a temporary world of crazy bouncy fun. With a minimum age of 18, the party animals don’t have to be afraid that they will trample little kids.

Inflatables fun

A total of 7500m2 will be filled with inflatables fun. It will be a Valhalla of bouncy castles, assault courses, water slides, bumper balls, base jumps and of course the classic ball pits. DJ’s will spin dance music that will enhance the bounce fun. Those interested for the event at Sportpark Sloten in Amsterdam can register on the website and receive a link to the ticketing system that will be available as from Saturday.

Clothing

The Facebook page of the organization challenges visitors to dress up as a team to win prizes, also the organization advises to wear clothes that are okay to get dirty and above all to bring dry / clean clothes. Inflatable items are allowed.

The inflatables festival: “Jump, dance, dive, fall, get up and move again”.

Magic Placemats, the new coloring

9-7-2015

Pamper your little guests with a magic placemat, a 3D digital coloring picture, and give them a visual experience in your restaurant. They are likely to remain in their seat longer, because seeing your own drawing come to life with the Prismar 3D Studio app is, of course, super cool!

The possibilities of the magic placemats

You can choose from standard magic placemats that can be brought to life in 3D with the Prismar app. The ‘magic drawings’ can be personalized and you can even create your own magic placemats. Photos of the magic personalized placemats can be shared through social media. Great for a ‘Share and Win’ campaign to gather email addresses, likes etc …
Additionally, certainly with older children, the possibility exists that they will be able to concentrate longer…. with the result that the parents can drink an extra glass of wine. It’s an ideal combination of old (coloring) and new (apps). So grandparents can enjoy watching their grandchildren draw a coloring picture and kids can still use their parents’ mobile or iPad!

A postcard instead of a digital message

8-7-2015

In restaurant Eastwood guests can send their greetings on a provided postcard, the recipient can collect a free beer with the card.

Postcard

On every table in restaurant Eastwood guests can find a tool box with napkins, cutlery, menus and even a postcard that they can fill out and send. For people that are quickly bored, this is a much prettier solution than reaching for their instead. The receiver of the card can hand it in for a free beer at the restaurant, now that’s a great thing to find in your letterbox!

Special visit

Guests can indicate how they feel and why they feel like that on the postcard. It’s a nice addition to the gimmicks that we’ve noticed earlier during a visit to the multifunctional (hotel) restaurant. Caroline Receveur is the general manager of DoubleTree by Hilton Amsterdam Centraal Station and also responsible for the restaurant. She says: “We are looking for ways to make the experience for both the guests and the staff as special as possible. Our most recent addition is a book for kids that that describes ‘The tale of Eastwood’, written by Bavo Galama.”

For anyone that wants to be surprised at a dinner, Eastwood is definitely recommended.

Beer pong cleaner with The Slip Cup™

8-7-2015

The Slip Cup creates ‘clean’ beer pong without changing a single aspect to the game. Mighty popular in the USA: beer pong. And often played in bars, whereas the ball touches the ground, the beer doesn’t get any healthier!

The Slip Cup™, is a cup insert for beer pong that fits into 16 and 18 ounce disposable cups.

Catch the ball and it doesn’t land in your beer anymore. The patent-pending protective barriers fit right onto your typical party cups and even feature a ‘catch element’ that keeps the ball from bouncing out and falling on dirty floors. The brothers behind the invention have raised over $40.000 (at Tuesday 7 July) toward their $70,000 Kickstarter campaign goal. The backers will score a 20-pack of Slip Cups when they’re ready later this summer for all kinds of ‘clean’ beer pong gaming. They  added numbers at the bottom of the Slip Cups and created 15 Brand-New Drinking Games with the Slip Cup!

Inspiring: a pop-up-traffic jam-concert

7-7-2015

Those people who were stuck in the traffic jam on the 30th of June at the A1 (highway), did pick a great moment to get stuck! A new classic festival, Wonderfeel, organized the first pop-up-traffic jam-concert in this traffic jam .

When the traffic jam occured, the side of a 16.5 meter platform truck opened. The New Amsterdam Clarinet Quartet supplemented with sousaphone and percussion began to play under the direction of a conductor and entertained hundreds of motorists.

Initiator Georges Mutsaerts: “We wanted the audience to enjoy classical music in a fun way in a place where you would least expect it. Motorists also reacted with disbelief to the totally unexpected performance. In order not to hinder the traffic the performance lasted no longer than 10 minutes. But in late July, Wonderfeel will return in collaboration with ‘Natuurmonumenten’ with 200 musicians and 100 concerts in nature area ‘s-Graveland for the ultimate relaxation this summer.”

Wonderfeel will take place in ‘s-Graveland in the nature area Schaep and Burgh at 24, 25 and 26 July.

Pop-up- traffic jam-concert as inspiration

It doesn’t seem conductive to road safety to organize a pop-up restaurant in the traffic jam. But we have spotted Twitter and Facebook messages from restaurants offering menu’s to those who stranded in a nearby traffic jam. We love to mention original ways to respond to a nearby traffic jam on horecatrends.com.

#Wildplanting By Bram Ladage

7-7-2015

On 26 June, a team of Bram Ladage planted potato plants at several places in the city of Rotterdam. This #wildplanting promotion celebrates the beginning of the potato season. Potatoes plants are planted by end June and the result will be harvested at Saturday, 12 September during ‘The Potato Harvest Day’.

#wildplanten

In their video one of the potato plants is planted at the center spot of ‘The Kuip’ (football stadium of Feyenoord) and the greengrocer Mehmet was surprised. “The potato is a fine Dutch product,” said Rocco Ladage of the company. “With this wild planting promotion we want to draw attention to this wonderful natural product and invite everyone for the Potato Harvest Day.” The promotion can be followed on social media via #wildplanten.

Bram Ladage and storytelling

Bram Ladage uses storystelling to tell the story behind his company and the main product he sells. In The Netherlands we have a lot of snackbars (kind of Chips shops), Bram Ladage owns a lot snack bars in and around Rotterdam. In 2012 they organized a ‘get familiar with the origine of your fries’ day. Anyone interested could join his team at a potato farm in Numansdorp to lift some potatoes. These potatoes were processed into chips on the spot. Bram Ladage also auctioned the first crate of newly harvested potatoes, the revenue of this crate went to the Sophia Children Hospital in Rotterdam. And some golden potatoes were hidden in the field for extra prizes.

Local touch

6-7-2015

Restaurant Joelia at the Hilton Rotterdam has incorporated a local touch of ‘Rotterdam’ in their restaurant and in their menu.

Local touch

Those who visit horecatrends.com on a regular basis know that I like to share distinctive details and small welcoming gestures. Last week I had dinner at restaurant Joelia, where Mario de Ridder is the chef. The interior of Joelia has had a lot of attention in many magazines with its striking design. My eyes immediately fell on the original placemats at the bar and the back of the bill afterwards. The reference to the Coolsingel in the Monopoly game is a nice local touch to this cosmopolitan concept.

Also a local touch on the menu

In his menu Mario de Ridder (former owner of the Zwethheul**) also added a local touch: ‘Colors or Rotterdam’. And although I have some ties with the city, I must confess that I had no idea of the colors of the city. That seems to be green and white, which was reflected in a delicious fish entree. And if you have the possibility to eat at Joelia’s at least try the ‘uitsmijter Joelia’, it’s so delicious! As listed on the website, Mario offers his guests an experience of top-gastronomy in all its facets. You can enjoy the Joelia’s Bites in the food corner or sitting at the bar, enjoy an aperitif in the wine cellar or experience Mario’s talent at the chef’s table or in the restaurant. We will be back, Rotterdam has a new top-level restaurant which we certainly recommend! ^Marjolein

The film about Great Coffee

3-7-2015

Watch this gorgeous short film (15 min) about Great Coffee. It is the story of passionate coffee connoisseur Søren Stiller Markussen, the owner and founder of Great Coffee in Aarhus, Denmark.

Great Coffee

He visits a coffee farm from Frederico Pacas (Café Tuxpal) a farm with six generations experience in the family that’s based in Finca Santra Petrona, El Salvador. He also visits New York for inspiration and notices that the baristas are all pursueing a unique style.

In the video Søren Stiller Markussen shows three different traditional methods of processing coffee beans.G
– Natural: drying the coffee with the skin
– Water processed: rinse the skin of with water
– Honey processed: Processed with honey Black (without water) and yellow honey (with water)

By measuring the sugar level during the fermentation process, the process can be stopped at the right moment to get a full, sweet body. The desired sugar content is 18-22% and takes about 4 hours to ferment, after that carbon dioxide and alcohol will start to form.

During the movie the coffee connoisseur gives a glimpse into his personal life as well. He explains his motivations in his life, in which Jiu Jitsu and swimming in the sea play a significant role.

Groups app The Happening popular among young people

3-7-2015

The Happening is an app for creating useful grids and sharing locations or photos all in one.

The Happening

After setting up a dating app, Frank van Viegen and Jelmer Feenstra came up with the idea to create an easier group communication tool than Whatsapp together with colleague Emiel Mols. They developed the Happening app which has been downloaded more than 100.000 times already. Group discussions in Whatsapp can become lengthy scroll sessions, the Happening is easier to use and navigate.

Photo Hunt and Game Ranking

The app provides practical solutions to problems, combining a pick-a-date app, shopping lists, a photo sharing app and a latitude app. Its popularity is partly due to a Photo Hunt feature where users get assignments, for example to create a selfie while you hug a tree. One of the other viral features is a Ranking Game to rank friends in a top three with questions like “Who is the funniest when he’s drunk?”, the feature is quite similar to the television program ‘Ranking The Stars’.

On all devices and web interface

The Happening is available for both Android devices and Apple’s and downloadable in the Apple Store and Play Store. The app is available for Windows computers and Mac computers as well.

Listen to the sounds of Paris in Amsterdam

2-7-2015

A billboard with inspiring sounds from other cities. Pedestrians in Paris, Brussels and Amsterdam are invited to listen to each other’s original sounds through their headphones at interactive billboards.

Listen to the sound of

The railroad company Thalys uses these 3 billboards to inspire passers-by with a sneak pre-hearing of a new travel experience. They of course want to encourage you to use the train to go and explore nearby cities. The billboards are made in collaboration with French advertising agency Rosapark.

Each billboard represents a city, the billboard of Amsterdam has 1352 sounds to tell the passers-by, Paris 1460 sounds and Brussels 1889. Pedestrians are invited to plug in with their personal headphones and start exploring. Enjoy a sound from Paris while strolling your hometown Amsterdam.

Like Pop-Up City describes, the billboards explore a new way of urban advertising. The focus on hearing is added to the visual impact of billboards. And with most of the people carrying earplugs nowadays, this technique might be used more…..