Yesterday Topshop announced the appointment of David Hagglund in the newly created position of 'Creative Director' across both Topshop and Topman.
Hagglund with replace Topshop's Creative Director Kate Phelan, and Topman's head creative Gordon Richardson, who have been at the company 6 years and 17 years respectively. The major shake up follows last month's hiring of Paul Price, previously merchandising officer at Burberry, to head up both the brands as chief executive, and Baroness Karren Brady's employment as the company's new Chairman.
Haggland currently runs a Stockholm based Creative Agency, Studio David Hagglund, who provide 'branding, creative direction, advertising and content creation for clients in the field of fashion and retail'.
Previous clients include H&M (the agency worked on H&M's 2017 global summer campaign), and Hugo Boss. Prior to running his own agency, Haggland was also the Art Director at Vogue Paris.
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Tapping a Scandinavian for the top job is a smart move from Arcadia considering the recent success of Scandi brands in the UK. In the past few years we've seen a flurry of Swedish brands open with great fanfare in the UK including & Other Stories, Arket and Weekday (all owned by H&M), and a growing influence of Scandi brands such as Ganni, Samsoe+Samsoe and Cecile Copenhagen.
Haggland's appointment signals a new direction for Topshop and Topman, one that is likely to unify the two brand's even closer together. Unsuprising considering the current shift towards gender fluidity in fashion, and the move towards designers showing their womenswear and menswear collections simultaneously.
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