Lidl has signed a 25-year deal to take on part of the former BHS store at The Mall shopping centre in Walthamstow.

The budget supermarket will open an 18,000 square-foot store in the ground floor space left vacant when the high street chain folded last year.

The new store is now expected to open at The Mall in early summer.

The centre’s manager, Alasdair Currie, said: “Lidl will further enhance our tenant mix for our customers and forms a key part of our transformational plans for a location that is emerging as one of London's most vibrant neighbourhoods.”

In December, The Gym Group agreed a 20-year lease to occupy a 25,000 square-foot unit at the centre also previously occupied by BHS.

The health chain has 96 branches across the UK and will be open 24 hours a day when the it launches at The Mall in mid-2017.

BHS closed the last of its 150 branches in 2016, 88 years after the business was launched on the high street.

It initially collapsed in April, affecting 11,000 jobs, 22,000 pensions and sparking a lengthy parliamentary inquiry.

Retail billionaire Sir Philip Green bore the brunt of the public fallout, having been branded the "unacceptable face of capitalism" by furious MPs.

Sir Philip owned BHS for 15 years before selling it to serial bankrupt Dominic Chappell for £1 in 2015.