Anyone who steps inside Piet de Leeuw's will walk right into the 1970s. Wooden floorboards that creak under your feet, paneling full of gin jars, oil paintings on the ceiling, stained-glass windows that filter the light and wrought-iron lamps that give everything a yellowish glow. The walls are full of photographs of guests through the decades, a living archive of everyone who ever sat at a table here. This is not an interior that was ever designed to be cool. It has simply never changed, and therein lies its strength.
Owner Loek van Thiel, 71, runs the business from PRL Horeca Group. He is the one who ensures that Piet de Leeuw runs as it always has: few tomfoolery, lots of character. The service there is direct and unpolished, in the way you expect at a real Amsterdam pub. No dolled-up service smiles, just someone who knows what you want before you know it yourself. Tourists looking for a streamlined restaurant experience are in the wrong place. Anyone who understands how Amsterdam works will feel right at home.
The space itself is a mix of brown pub and living room. Wooden furniture that doesn't have to match, a shiny beer pump behind the bar, and an atmosphere you can't easily find anywhere else in town. There's also a separate room for when you want to meet up with a group. But really, Pete the Lion's strength is that you can just walk in, too. Reservations can be made, but you don't have to.
As long as it lasts, Pete the Lion is just Pete the Lion: a place that does not try to be something it is not.
Noorderstraat is a quiet side street, within walking distance of the hustle and bustle around Rembrandtplein and the Heineken Experience, but once you pull the door of Piet de Leeuw shut behind you, you don't notice any of that. Loek van Thiel is offering the business including the real estate for sale, so who knows how long this will last. But while it lasts, Piet de Leeuw is just Piet de Leeuw: a place that doesn't try to be something it's not.