When administrators announced every BHS was to close, including all those in Kent, prominent shop fronts in the centres of towns and cities across the country sat empty.

Billionaire retail tycoon Sir Philip Green sold the department store chain in March 2015 for £1 to a consortium led by businessman Dominic Chappell, who had filed for bankruptcy on three occasions.

In April 2016 it was declared the shopping giant had entered administration. And by the end of August of the same year, the last of its stores were shut.

The move cost 11,000 people their jobs and left a pension deficit of £571 million. The controversy surrounding the chain’s collapse triggered Green’s rapid fall from grace.

Having previously been known as “the king of the high street”, he faced calls to be stripped of his knighthood following a parliamentary probe into the collapse of the company.

A report published following the investigation concluded: “The truth is that a large proportion of those who have got rich or richer off the back of BHS are to blame.

“Sir Philip Green, Dominic Chappell and their respective directors, advisers and hangers-on are all culpable.

“The tragedy is that those who have lost out are the ordinary employees and pensioners. This is the unacceptable face of capitalism.”

Green agreed to pay £363 million into the BHS pension fund in 2017 and he has clung onto his knighthood.

But four years on from the breakdown of the chain, reminders of the former stores have been erased from high streets throughout Kent.

In their place stand Primarks, discount retailers and vacant shop fronts.

Here is what seven of the county’s branches of the defunct retail giant look like now…

County Square, Ashford

Uncertainty started to surround the store’s future in the shopping centre soon after Chappell’s acquisition of BHS, when signs stating “Closeout – everything must go” appeared in its windows.

A spokesman for the store insisted it was a marketing ploy but the following month it was included in a list of 52 under-performing shops across the country that could be closed, sold or down-sized.

Representatives confirmed in March 2016 that bosses were in discussions with County Square in an attempt to significantly reduce rent payments. However, its closure was confirmed three months later – more than a decade after it started trading in the shopping centre.

The site remained empty until The Only Way is Essex z-lister James Lock cut the ribbon to open a new branch of Poundland in April 2018. The discount chain continues to trade from the premises.

Marlowe Arcade, Canterbury

It was revealed seven years ago that the Whitefriars store was set to close after trading in the city centre for almost 30 years.

Before it closed in January, shopping centre chiefs confirmed Primark had struck a deal to take on the 40,000 sq ft site and crowds of bargain hunters queued back into Watling Street ahead of the new three-floor superstore’s June 2014 opening.

Then 17-year-old Bethany Hunt, from Faversham, was at the front of the queue and the first through its doors. She said: “I have been here since about 8am just making sure I was first in line. I can’t believe I managed to be first. It is my new claim to fame and my mum is going to be so proud.”

The towering clothes shop, which employs more than 300 people, remains one of the city’s most popular retailers.

Bouverie Place, Folkestone

As in Canterbury, a Primark now occupies the site of Folkestone’s former BHS.

The latter was one of the first shops to open when Bouverie Place welcomed its first customers in 2007, following two years of building work, costing about £30 million.

But just three years later, it was one of 10 stores to sell its lease to the budget fashion retailer.

The deal formed part of a shake-up of Green's property portfolio and followed his decision to merge BHS with the rest of his Arcadia retail empire, which included Topshop and Dorothy Perkins.

Hempstead Valley, Gillingham

The large shopping centre unit at the out of town complex sat empty for about a year prior to the arrival of a pop-up furniture store.

The 12,600 sq ft store became the country’s largest M&Co shortly afterwards in November 2017.

But the Scottish clothes and homeware store, which employed about 30 members of staff, shut down in March.

The unit has been left vacant once more.

New Road, Gravesend

One of the town’s oldest stores, BHS had become a fixture in New Road over the 70 years it had been trading.

Having occupied the prominent site since the Second World War, the shop locked its doors in August 2016.

It remained empty for about a year until family-run furniture retailer Image moved into the premises.

But the independent store had a short-term lease and soon left the site.

The Mall, Maidstone

Having remained empty since its closure it 2016, the former BHS is covered with temporary hoardings.

But prior to the outbreak of Covid-19, it was announced that Matalan was set to move into the space in King Street in the summer.

Matalan had planned to close its branch in Broadway, Maidstone, once its new store had opened.

The future of that shop was thrown into doubt after the borough council announced it hoped to build flats on the site last year. The local authority selected the shopping centre as part of its Maidstone West opportunity site - one of five areas it had earmarked for housing and business development.

Royal Victoria Place, Tunbridge Wells

The vast Calverly Road store was among the final 163 BHSes to be closed in August 2016.

Since then, the two-storey premises have remained empty.

A brochure released by Savills towards the end of last year advertising sites inside the shopping complex states that the owners were in negotiations with an operator for the former BHS.

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