Rooms Of Red Bull: Stimulate Your Mind

Another creative space in Amsterdam officially opened its doors yesterday: the so-called Rooms of Red Bull. For three months during summer, Rooms of Red Bull will be a temporary hotspot of inspiration and creation.  The project is a collaboration of Red Bull and housing corporation Ymere, which owns the property after a rip deal in the Amsterdam red light crime scene. The whole idea behind the Rooms of Red Bull is to create a inspiring place for young creative talent in Amsterdam… words that sound familiar in the local policy circle these days.

Rooms of Red Bull is an open space, which could be very nice. People can come and work on art, music, cinema and photo projects, and organise exhibitions and performances. The three story building contains an exposition room, an inspiration room and a creation room. Besides that, there’s a room with all possible facilities for music production and performance. Rooms of Red Bull is located in the Amsterdam Red Light District and looks a bit like an old sex cinema.  The ground floor is designed as a night club with a touch of this sex cinema experience. Some specific elements such as TL lights next to the windows and the neon logo, emphasise this atmosphere. A little cutting edge, but not too much.

Yesterday’s opening was as inspiring as it was meant to be. The concept is really interesting and deserves to be encouraged. But all the good meanings and true collaboration to the Amsterdam creative scene can not cover the real message behind the project: Red Bull wants to be cool among the hipsters. What remains is the question: will this work out? Will it be possible to actually plan creativity and spontanity? We’ll see. A possible threat could be the huge institutional character of the project. The complete inner circle that exploits creativity in Amsterdam seems to be on board again, which might finally could mean a huge border for fresh people to drop in and start creating.