Cheshire-based fashion to homewares e-commerce business The Hut Group is to take 51K SF at Manchester Airport as the South Manchester market takes off.

The signing to the Hut — which comes as GCHQ begin to search for a large site for their new Manchester base — confirms the bounce-back of the once beleaguered South Manchester business park scene.

Manchester Office Agents Forum figures, published in April, showed South Manchester Q1 take-up of 178, up 27% on the same period in 2017.

The deal — the largest yet at MAG Property's Airport City portfolio — means the Hut take 27K SF on a 10-year lease at the 96K SF 4M building next to the airport railway station, and another 24K SF at the Voyager office building, this time with a five-year lease.

“Airport City is able to offer unrivalled scale in a mid-urban setting, being ideally located between Manchester City Centre and Cheshire," MAG Property Chief Executive Lynda Shillaw said.

Last month MAG Property revealed the creation of a new £180M hotel district at the airport, following signings to Ibis and Holiday Inn.