The triangle formed by the Nieuwe Binnenweg, Mathenesserlaan and ’s-Gravendijkwal long had something of a wild reputation. The nightlife was rowdy, and prostitutes and drugs dealers walked the streets. That started to change in the mid-1980s, when we opened the Wester Paviljoen grand café. It had been a place for travellers between Rotterdam and Delfshaven, then still a village, to stop for a meal and a drink since around 1895. In the last century, it also served as the company restaurant for employees of Unilever.

Today, the Wester Paviljoen – its authentic state still partly preserved – is known as the city’s ‘living room’. The whole of Rotterdam meets there to chat and relax in the large terrace or in the spacious café-restaurant, ‘just like in the old days’. The surroundings are now just as attractive, with the Nieuwe Binnenweg as one of the best and most diverse shopping streets in Rotterdam.