The agricultural scene before me is typically Dutch: tulips and narcissi tilt towards the sun, rows of vegetables peep their frilly heads through the earth, and chickens peck for snacks in the soil. Only I’m in the heart of urban Rotterdam. I’ve just crossed the Coolsingel’s six lanes of traffic and climbed the concrete steps of a 1960s office block to a rooftop seven floors up.
The 1,000m² DakAkker (roof field), home to bustling brunch cafe Teds, is the largest rooftop farm in the Netherlands, serving local businesses with fresh produce, generating solar energy, and storing 9,000l of rainwater to reduce flooding and quench droughts. From roofs such as this visitors can marvel at the patchwork city; the mirrored skyscrapers and brutalist behemoths dwarf the few remaining monumental buildings, acting as contrasting emblems of Rotterdam past and present.
