Downtown Needham will be losing a pioneering restaurant but gaining a novel bank/pop-up retail operation after Newton-based Village Bank takes over the expiring lease held by Masala Art at 990 Great Plain Ave.
Village Bank reps said they will provide Masala Art owners the time they require to wind down the restaurant, which brought Indian cuisine to Needham in 2003 at the former site of the Hit or Miss retail store.
The bank has an early 2027 target date to begin the build-out for a new use that will be both a Village Bank branch and the first of what is planned to be a series of pop-up retail shops. The retail operators will occupy 850 of the site’s 4,000+ square feet and the plan is for brands to rotate on four-to-six month intervals…