RENOVATIONS have turned heads at Banshees Bar & Artspace, with the club’s new frontage harking back to the glory days of theatre and live entertainment.
The impressive new façade features Corinthian columns and arched window casings reflecting on the architecture of the grand public buildings directly opposite the venue – the Old Ipswich Town Hall and the Ipswich Post Office.
The venue received a $24,000 grant from Arts Queensland through the Live Music Venue Business program to refurbish and rebrand the frontage, and further works to improve seating, dancefloor and stage accessibility.
Owners of the Brisbane Street live music venue, Al Wheeler and Tim Glorious, said they had been planning to refresh the frontage since they took over the venue three years ago and recruited designer Eva Fritz.
“We were initially going to get Eva to change up the art out front – and she said what if we do something bigger,” Al said.
Tim said Eva had used the architecture of the surrounding grand buildings for inspiration in the design.
“We were definitely thinking about Ipswich and the architecture that already exists and hoping to complement it and pay homage to it,” he said.
Al said the feedback already received on the renovations was overwhelmingly positive.
The venue has put Ipswich on the map for the music scene throughout South East Queensland since it opened in 2018, offering a smaller space vital to nurturing upcoming talent, and nationally for touring Australian acts, at a time when many venues have struggled to keep the doors open.
“There’s been some amazing acts coming through, all sorts of different genres, all sorts of calibres,” Tim said.
“It’s really great to see and the audience always appreciates it and the acts themselves love the Ipswich audience and how much they appreciate live music.”
Al said discovering new talent and supporting the future of Australian music was vital for the venue.
“What is the point of being a venue if you can’t support people who aren’t already known?” he said.
“Discovering new things is mostly why I do this. It is really important.”
