As the city grew beyond the cramped confines of its historic core, new suburbs were built, both residential and commercial, and beyond them, entire new towns.

Visitors negotiating the traffic around the vast RAI Congresgebouw exhibition centre might find it hard to believe that this was once opened polderland. The RAI’s complex of glass-and-steel exhibition halls has been expanding and modernising on its present location since 1961. Now it takes all kinds: religious revivals, Aids congresses, performances by Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw Orchestra, the Modern Homes Exhibition, Jumping Amsterdam (a horse-jumping event), cat shows, dog shows, fashion shows, car shows, boat shows.

The complex, located just a matter of minutes by train from Schiphol Airport, has more than 30 000 square metres of halls, its own railway and Metro station, express tram links, a bus station, vast underground and above-ground car parks, and even its own harbour linked to the city’s canal network.

Just one train and Metro stop west of the RAI is the cluster of office towers of Amsterdam’s World Trade Centre, dubbed De Blauwe Engel (The Blue Angel) for its oceans of blue-tinted glass. This emphasis on business carries over into the extensive commercial zones of Amsterdam Zuid Oost (Southeast), where the modern architecture is often award-winning, notably the organic architecture of the ING Bank Building (1987).

Zuidoost’s Bijlmermeer district is the location of the Amsterdam ArenA. This superlative stadium of the city’s football aces Ajax (and the national team) doubles as a venue for concerts by international superstars and supergroups. An entire entertainment complex of cinemas, theatres, museums, restaurants and cafés has grown up around the ArenA, and further expansion is planned.