Spaces with a story. Salon goes live in the Netherlands with expansion across the EU to follow.
Salon, a venture initiated by EIT Culture & Creativity and its partners network, has launched in the Netherlands, opening Europe's first curated B2B marketplace dedicated to cultural and heritage event spaces. Starting in Amsterdam, the platform makes museums, music halls, theatres, libraries and historic estates discoverable and bookable for professional events, with expansion continuing across the Netherlands and, from there, across the EU.
Among the first venues live on the platform are the Zuiderkerk, Hendrick de Keyser's landmark seventeenth-century church; the Embassy of the Free Mind, the seventeenth-century house on the Keizersgracht; Moco Amsterdam, the independent modern and contemporary art museum on the Museumplein; H'ART Museum, the grand former Amstelhof on the banks of the Amstel; Arcam, Amsterdam's centre for architecture on the Oosterdok waterfront; and Boom Chicago, the English-language comedy theatre in the Jordaan, among others.
A gap in Europe's cultural infrastructure
Europe is full of extraordinary places: libraries that shaped generations of thought, museums that safeguard the highest expressions of human creativity, and heritage buildings that carry memory and meaning. Yet many stand underused while public funding declines. Just beyond their doors, companies, creatives and communities search for inspiring environments to gather, and struggle to access them.
Until now there has been no dedicated, trusted infrastructure connecting the two. Cultural and heritage venues are hard to discover, harder to book, and often new to space rental altogether. Salon closes that gap. It is not a standard venue directory: every space is individually selected and verified, every booking runs on a digital rental agreement, and payments are protected. This is the challenge at the heart of Europe's cultural and creative sectors and industries (CCSI): how storied institutions can stay financially resilient without compromising the mission that makes them irreplaceable.
“As a place dedicated to the preservation of cultural heritage for the future, we stand alongside Salon’s principles from its origins. The platform allows our UNESCO-listed collection and its home to reach new audiences in the culture sector, creating more opportunities for corporates and privates alike to hold unique gatherings in our special venue”, Maria Marqués, Venue & Creative Partnerships, Embassy of the Free Mind
New ventures to tackle market gaps in the creative industries
Salon was initiated by EIT Culture & Creativity, the institutional partnership for Europe's cultural and creative sectors and industries, supported by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), a body of the European Union. Together with the City of Amsterdam and the European Cultural Foundation, EIT Culture & Creativity identified a number of challenges and market gaps in the culture and creative sectors which could be tackled by the creation of new ventures. Salon is the first of these venture building initiatives and it builds directly on EIT Culture & Creativity's ambitions for open public spaces and shared infrastructure, and on its work to strengthen the role of cultural institutions in social innovation, sustainability and financial resilience.
The alignment is strategic. EIT Culture & Creativity exists to help Europe's cultural sector grow more entrepreneurial and more resilient. Salon turns that ambition into working infrastructure, giving institutions a practical, mission-aligned way to generate revenue from the spaces they already hold. The approach also supports several United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, from sustainable economic growth and resilient infrastructure to safeguarding cultural heritage and enabling partnerships between public institutions and private actors.
How Salon works
Salon operates as a marketplace that connects Europe's story-rich cultural and historic venues with professional organisers: creative agencies, brands, production teams, conferences and cultural foundations seeking spaces that inspire.
For venues, Salon handles discovery, curation and the mechanics of trust. Institutions are listed and verified, matched with vetted organisers, and supported through digital rental agreements and protected payments. Many partner venues have never engaged with space rental before, and Salon is built to support and equip them at every step. For organisers, Salon opens access to settings they may never have imagined they could book, each one selected for character and meaning rather than quantity of listings.
The name is deliberate. In nineteenth-century Europe, the salon was where ideas met their audience, as artists, thinkers and patrons gathered in extraordinary spaces. Not venue hire: a meeting of minds. The Netherlands, with its dense network of monuments, museums and civic cultural spaces and its openness to innovation, is a natural place to bring that spirit back.
"We are glad to welcome Salon to the market. It gives us a way to reach new organisers from across Europe, people who might not have found this beautiful, authentic space on their own", Gerrit Key, General Manager, Zuiderkerk, Amsterdam
The team behind Salon
In addition to the support of EIT Culture & Creativity, Salon is led by Tamas Egei, experienced Venture Builder and formerly Head of International Expansion at TicketSwap, and Judit Lungela-Szloboda, whose earlier work includes early roles at Airbnb in Europe and Etsy in France.
Between them they helped scale some of the world's leading marketplaces, trusted, two-sided platforms that earned the confidence of very different communities on each side, and now apply that experience to a question closer to home: how Europe's cultural infrastructure stays vibrant and financially resilient for future generations. What began as conversations inside the EIT Culture & Creativity network grew into a platform, launching first in the Netherlands, one event at a time.
"We don't see these places as square metres to fill. We see remarkable spaces, many of them quietly overlooked, that most organisers never get the chance to step inside. Salon exists to open those doors: to give people access to authentic cultural spaces, and to help the venues themselves turn quiet, underused days into something that strengthens their mission and their future. And we are building it as European technology, in service of Europe's own cultural institutions", Tamas Egei.
The first venues
- Zuiderkerk: A landmark seventeenth-century church by architect Hendrick de Keyser, now a distinctive setting for exhibitions, gatherings and events in the heart of Amsterdam.
- Embassy of the Free Mind: Seventeenth-century canal house turned museum and library of free thinking, whose Grote Zaal and garden host gatherings in the tradition of the original salons.
- Moco Amsterdam: Independent museum for modern and contemporary art on the Museumplein, where works by artists from Banksy to KAWS form a bold backdrop for receptions and private viewings.
- H'ART Museum: The monumental former Amstelhof on the Amstel, previously Hermitage Amsterdam, now presenting exhibitions with international partner museums and offering stately courtyard and gallery spaces for events.
- Arcam: Amsterdam's centre for architecture, housed in a striking aluminium-clad building by René van Zuuk on the Oosterdok waterfront.
- Boom Chicago: Amsterdam's English-language comedy theatre in the Jordaan, where a working stage and bar make an unconventional setting for receptions, presentations and company events.
Get involved
Salon is live now at hostsalon.eu. Cultural and heritage venues can list their space and join the platform, and organisers can explore and book venues across Amsterdam, with more of the Netherlands coming online through 2026. To find out more, list a space or discuss a partnership, visit the website or contact the team.