Most hotel bars in the centre of Amsterdam close somewhere between midnight and one. The last guests are gently encouraged towards the lifts, the lights come up a little, and a particular kind of traveller finds himself standing in the lobby wide awake, with no wish to go out into the cold and no wish to go to bed. An after midnight massage was made for exactly this person.
The after midnight massage, seen from the lobby
The message can be sent before you have even pressed the lift button. Say where the hotel is, how long you want and that you would like her to come as soon as she can. The line is staffed through the night by coordinators who are working, not woken, and a reply with a name and an arrival time comes in about ten minutes.
From there, the therapist reaches any central address in forty to sixty minutes. That means a message sent at ten past one produces a knock at around two. It sounds late, and it is, but for a guest who was never going to sleep before three, it is simply the right time.
Why the bar is a poor place to wait
It is tempting to order one last drink while waiting. We would gently suggest otherwise. Another glass at one in the morning makes the session feel heavier and the next day feel longer. Go up to the room instead, drink a large glass of water and take a warm shower. By the time she writes to say she is close, you will be clear-headed and relaxed rather than drowsy.
The room also needs a few minutes. Turn the air conditioning off or the heating up, since rooms cool quickly at night. Switch on one lamp. If the window faces the street, close the curtains fully, because the light from a room at two in the morning is very visible from outside.
The night porter
After midnight many hotels lock the front door and put a single night porter on the desk. Guests sometimes worry about this, and there is no need. A visitor arriving calmly at two o'clock is an ordinary sight for a night porter, who has seen every kind of guest return at every kind of hour. She will walk in as though she is staying in the building.
The only practical question is the lift. If your hotel uses key cards, tell the thread, and she will write to you from the lobby so you can meet her at the lift. Our note on the card-locked lift explains how that moment is handled.
How long, at this hour
After one in the morning, most guests choose ninety minutes, at 270 euros for one guest with one therapist. An hour, at 180 euros, is enough if you have an early start. Two hours, at 360 euros, is the choice of the guest whose body clock is still on another continent and who knows sleep will not come for a while anyway.
There is no night supplement. The hour after one costs what the hour after lunch costs. What does apply is the house deposit rule: a first booking with the house, any session of three hours or more, any overnight and any booking with two therapists is confirmed with half the fee in advance, by card, Revolut, Wise or crypto. A returning guest booking one or two hours for the same night pays everything in the room.
After she has gone
The quiet reward of a session that ends at half past three is what happens next, which is usually nothing at all. The corridor is silent, the city outside has stopped, and sleep tends to arrive quickly and stay. Guests who have tried it often say they slept better that night than on any other night of the trip.
If this is a habit you expect to repeat, the after midnight page covers the small hours in more detail, from the first message to the moment the door closes.