6 Best Sights in Amsterdam, Netherlands

Built between 1620 and 1631 by Hendrick de Keyser, the Dutch Renaissance-style Westerkerk was the largest Protestant church in the world until St. Paul's Cathedral in London was built in 1675. The Westerkerk's 85-meter-tall Ouwe Wester, still the tallest church tower in the city, is topped by a bright blue copy of the crown of the Habsburg emperor Maximilian I, who gave Amsterdam the right to use his royal insignia in 1489 in gratitude for support given to the Austro-Burgundian princes.

The church is renowned for its organ and carillon (there are regular lunchtime concerts from March through September). The carillon is played every Tuesday at noon by a real person (a carillonneur) but is automated at other times with different songs tinkling out on the quarter hour, day and night. Anne Frank described the tunes in her diary. Rembrandt, who lived on Rozengracht during his poverty-stricken last years, and his son, Titus, are buried (somewhere) here. The Westertoren (Westerkerk Tower) is a fun climb from April to the end of October, though it's closed for renovations until 2025. 

Landmarking the eastern corner of the Waterlooplein, this structure once had a warehouse facade to disguise its function as a clandestine Catholic church. If this church could speak, it would name-drop the great philosopher Spinoza (it was built on the location of his birth house) and Franz Liszt (it hosted a recital of his Graner Messe, attended by the Hungarian composer himself). Originally built in the 1640s, it was rebuilt in 1841 by architect T. F. Suys, then refurbished in 1969. The church's popular name (Moses and Aaron) refers to the figures adorning two gable stones of the original edifice, now seen in the rear wall. In a rare move in a rapidly secularizing country where churches are sometimes turned into carpet stores or bowling alleys, the Mozes en Aäronkerk was reconsecrated in 2014, after a hiatus of 34 years. It's used today by the Catholic Community of Sant'Egidio.

Nieuwe Kerk (New Church) is a soaring late-Gothic structure whose tower was never completed because the authorities blew all their money on the city hall (now the Royal Palace) next door. Check out the magnificently sculpted oak pulpit by Albert Vinckenbrinck, constructed after the Great Fire of 1645. It took him 15 years to complete, although there is now a bit missing: the scales from a Lady of Justice were an impulsively generous gift to the Canadians, who helped to liberate Amsterdam. Other features include the unmarked grave of the poet and playwright Van den Vondel (the "Dutch Shakespeare") and Rombout Verhulst's extravagantly sculpted eulogy to naval hero Admiral Michiel de Ruyter (you can peer through a glass to see his actual coffin in the crypt).

Amsterdam's oldest building has evolved over many centuries to look as it does today. What began as a wooden chapel in the 13th century was built up to a hall church and then a cross basilica between 1366 and 1566 (and fully restored between 1955 and 2013). Prior to the Reformation, the Oude Kerk was known as "the living room," because peddlers displayed their goods in the church and beggars slept there. It was violently looted during the Reformation and stripped of its altars and images of saints—although the looters did leave the 14th-century paintings still visible on its wooden roof, as well as the Virgin Mary stained-glass windows that had been set in place in 1550. The famed Vater-Müller organ was installed in 1726. Don't miss the carved choir stalls that illustrate proverbs relating to cardinal sins, among other things. Within this open, atmospheric space, there's a gravestone for Rembrandt's first wife, Saskia van Uylenburgh, and also for Kiliaen van Rensselaer, one of the Dutch founders of what is now New York. Outside, embedded in the sidewalk by the door, is a bronze plaque of hand cupping a naked breast; it's one of a series of pieces of art anonymously placed throughout Amsterdam by an artist in the 1990s. Today, the Oude Kerk is as much an exhibition space as a place of worship, hosting top-notch modern art shows. Its carillon is played every Tuesday at 2 and every Saturday at 4—the best place to listen is the bridge in front of the church.

The architect A. C. Bleijs designed this Catholic church with its large dome, twin steeples, and colorful stained-glass windows as a replacement for all the clandestine churches that operated during the Reformation. After the Oude Kerk and the Ons' Lieve Heer op Solder (Our Lord in the Attic) chapel, this church, completed in 1887, became the third (and probably final) Sint-Nicolaas church in Amsterdam. Saint Nicholas, the all-purpose patron saint of children, thieves, prostitutes, sailors, and the City of Amsterdam, transforms into Sinterklaas in mid-November, when he is popularly said to arrive from Spain on a steamboat with his helper Piet (formerly Black Pete). The eve of his birthday on December 6 is celebrated as a family feast when everyone exchanges presents and poems. The church hosts a Choral evensong on Saturday at 5 and a Gregorian chant vesper service on Sunday at 5, September through June.

Gorgeous enough to have inspired both Sir Christopher Wren and Claude Monet, this famous church was built between 1601 and 1614 by Hendrick de Keyser, one of the most prolific architects of Holland's Golden Age (he also chose to be buried here). It was one of the earliest churches built in Amsterdam in the Renaissance style and was the first in the city to be built for the (Protestant) Dutch Reformed Church. During the Dutch famine of 1944 (known as the Hunger Winter), it served as a morgue. The church's hallowed floors, under which three of Rembrandt's children are buried, are now rented out as an events and exhibitions venue. The church tower—a soaring accumulation of columns, brackets, and balustrades—is one of the most glorious exclamation points in Amsterdam.