The building was designed to convey financial authority through architecture. Its neoclassical facade, with tall granite columns and symmetrical proportions, follows the tradition of banking architecture that treats financial institutions as secular temples. The interior features a grand banking hall with soaring ceilings, marble floors, and the kind of decorative detail that reassured depositors and borrowers that their money was in solid hands.

When the Federal Reserve relocated to a modern building, the old headquarters was repurposed as the Bently Reserve, an event and conference venue. The grand banking hall, once filled with tellers and bankers, now hosts weddings, galas, and corporate events. The conversion preserved the architectural grandeur while finding a new economic use for a building too distinctive to demolish and too specialized to serve its original purpose.

The Old Federal Reserve Bank Building belongs to a tradition of American financial architecture that used classical forms to project stability and trust. In a city that has been destroyed by earthquake and fire, these solid, columned buildings represented permanence. That the Federal Reserve eventually outgrew the building and moved on is itself a kind of economic history -- the institution grew beyond what even a monumental building could contain.