New lease of life for bar

NEWCASTLE'S Theatre Royal has unveiled plans to transform a former bar and restaurant into a new leisure venue.

- By COREENA FORD

DatBar once welcomed crowds of diners with its menu of burgers, pizzas and chicken, served alongside craft beers, cocktails and wines, but the Market Street venue - set within the Theatre Royal building in Newcastle city centre - has now been closed for many months.

Now, however, theatre bosses are looking to give the huge bar space a new lease of life as a leisure venue to be enjoyed by theatre audiences and the public. It revealed late last year how it had started working up designs for the bar with architects MawsonKerr and interior designers Design North, as part of plans to create two new bars.