86 AND 86A, HIGH STREET (See details for further address information)

National Provincial Bank, later converted to shop, building society and other offices. Built in 1854, with a slightly later extension at the far end of the Cross Street front.

The main High Street front is constructed of oolitic limestone ashlar, while the return to Cross Street is of red brick with similar stone dressings. The rear wing facing Cross Street is also red brick with dressings of limestone and granite. The roof of the main range is not visible from the street, but features a red brick chimney with moulded stone cap and three chimneypots with pockets at the right-hand end of the return front. The rear wing has a slated mansard roof.

The building is arranged on a 2-room plan to the main range, with main and back stairs contained in the rear wing. It is designed in the Italianate style and rises to 3 storeys, with a garret over the rear wing.

The main range presents a 2-window range to High Street and 3 windows to Cross Street. The ground storey was rebuilt in the 20th century. The upper storeys to High Street are rusticated, with a pedestal course below the 2nd-storey windows and a modillioned top cornice. The left-hand window in each storey has an eared architrave. The right-hand side features a matching window in the 2nd storey set in a recess rising through both storeys. Square flanking columns between antae support an entablature, above which is a round arch with scroll keystone. Within the arch is a cartouche carrying a coat of arms and flanked by horns of plenty. Beneath them is carved "NATIONAL PROVINCIAL BANK". A balustraded balcony fronts the window. Flanking the recess is a pair of attached columns with enriched Ionic capitals, with the entablature breaking forward above each one, where it is surmounted by a large urn.

The return front to Cross Street has broad rusticated pilasters and entablature sections at each end. The windows in the centre have eared architraves; those in the 2nd storey have pulvinated friezes and cornices. The rear wing is 4 windows wide, with segmental-headed windows and keystones. Upper storey windows have barred sashes. A pedestal course runs below the 2nd storey. The left-hand bay differs in having a round-arched stair window set in a shallow recess rising through the 2nd and 3rd storeys. In the ground storey, the second bay from the right has a round-arched doorway with rusticated granite surround and a fanlight with ornate cast-iron grille. The original ground storey to High Street, with rusticated masonry, is recorded in a photograph from 1881.

Interior features include first-floor front rooms with cornices enriched with rosettes and egg-and-dart ornament. The left-hand room contains a white marble chimneypiece with flanking pilasters, frieze and moulded shelf; the pilasters have incised decoration, and the frieze features fleur-de-lys at each end with a wreath in the centre. A cast-iron grate inscribed "WRIGHTS PATENT BIVALVE" is set within. Plainer marble chimneypieces appear on the second floor and in the wing.

The main stair rises from the first floor as a wooden open-well construction with closed strings, thin round iron balusters and a continuous handrail. The handrail is voluted at the foot around a lily-pattern iron newel.

The National Provincial Bank opened its branch on this site in 1835. In 1854, R.D. Gould advertised for a contractor to rebuild the bank according to a design prepared by the bank's architect, though it remains unclear whether Gould himself was the architect or whether the design came from someone employed nationally by the bank.