The Migration Museum hopes to reach a new audience in Lewisham Shopping Centre

The Migration Museum is hoping to reach a whole new audience by opening in a shopping centre.

It is moving into what was a branch of fashion chain H&M in Lewisham. Changing rooms have been turned into listening booths where visitors can hear personal stories of migration.

Museum director Sophie Henderson said she hoped it provided “a middle ground” to debate a “central issue” of British history.

She described the museum’s previous home, at London Fire Brigade’s former fire engine workshop near Lambeth Bridge, as “slightly tucked away”, adding: “What’s truly exciting about taking this to the shopping centre is 15 million people pass through that place every year.”

The museum opens next month with planned exhibitions including one that recreates the rooms where new immigrants to London made their homes. A planned show about emigration is timed to coincide with the 400th anniversary of the sailing of the Mayflower to North America.