Earlier this year we noticed the achingly bleak trend of East Village institutions becoming bank branches. And though the tears on our cheeks aren't yet evaporated, it's time to mourn that trend's converse: banking institutions turning into condos, grocery stores or some other bourgeois shit. A ride down Bowery proves our point.

First you've got Capitale, a gorgeous Stanford White space that used to house the Bowery Bank. That's where gays and TV people tend to throw their annual annoying parties. Further east, we find the abhorrent club Element, in a building that was originally built as a bank in the 1800's. Up in Chelsea, we have Balducci's pawning its tomatillos in the 1897 building for the New York Savings Bank. And a Trader Joe's will open up in the home of the former Independence Savings Bank on Court Street and Atlantic Avenue.

What bank will fall victim next? Our money is the Williamsburg HSCB, which could easily be made into a Whole Foods. We can't promise it'll soon be gone but it's pretty much money in the bank. Zing.