Its ornate pillars and imposing high ceiling have been used to the quiet hum of bank tellers pressing calculators and counting bank notes and customers waiting patiently in line.
But on Friday night Whanganui's iconic National Bank building on the corner of Majestic Square was throbbing to the mega-decibel boom
of house music as the city's latest watering hole took off.
The downstairs floor of the old bank has been converted into a bar - christened "Frank" - and it had its "soft opening" on Friday.
However, "soft" hardly seemed the right description as the venue was packed with young people, the bar was doing a roaring trade and the DJ's sounds were pulsating around the room.
The building - under new ownership - will have a business hub upstairs with shared work space for small businesses and start-ups. And now those budding entrepreneurs will have somewhere to unwind after the day's work.
