Empty Retford bank to become restaurant with walk-in safe as kitchen

The ground floor of the former Yorkshire Bank, which closed around 2017, will now be known as The Vault.

The restaurant will incorporate parts of the bank’s heritage, with the customer service desk becoming a feature of the bar.

A planning application by Christopher Dukes says it will be open seven days a week, serving hot meals, light bites, drinks and alcoholic beverages.

The large walk-in safe will become part of the kitchen.

The room to the rear of the safe, which may once have been the bank manager’s office, will become a back area for the kitchen.

Few alternations will be needed to the outside of the Grade II-listed building, which dates back to the mid-1700s.

The section of wall where a cash point used to be will have brickwork replaced, ‘creating a more pleasant appearance rather than the rusty metal and boarded up window that is currently there’.

A decision by Bassetlaw Council says the new occupier would help to preserve the building’s historical features.

The new signs will be a similar style and position to those of the former bank.

The restaurant says it plans to work closely with the escape rooms which occupy the upper floor to attract more visitors to the town centre.

One local resident questioned whether there would be outdoor music and seating after 11pm, but was told this wouldn’t be the case.

Yorkshire Bank had been part of Retford town centre since at least the 1960s, but closed as online banking has increasingly taken over from in-person interactions.