Alessandro Michele is the new Creative Director of Gucci

Gucci has confirmed the appointment of the new Creative Director.

The news - and the talent - is in: Alessandro Michele, formerly associate to Gucci’s ex-creative director Frida Giannini, has himself now been appointed creative director of Gucci.

The news was strategically announced yesterday, to steal a march on (and a few headlines from) the opening day of the autumn/winter 2015 Paris menswear collections.

It came as no enormous surprise, despite rumours swirling that names in the running included Tomas Maier (currently helming Kering stablemate Bottega Veneta) or Givenchy’s Riccardo Tisci.

Those names could easily be seduced by a brand with the heft of Gucci: it’s value is estimated as £8.2bn by Forbes. As far as luxury brands go, it is only bettered in those figures by Louis Vuitton.

But thrusting a behind-the-scenes do-gooder like Michele into the limelight doesn’t just make for newsworthy Cinderella-style straplines. It’s something of a trend right now: largely unknown designers have been appointed to high-profile roles at Hermes and Sonia Rykiel (the latter Julie de Libran of Louis Vuitton; the former an ex-design director of the feted Olsen twins-helmed The Row, Nadège Vanhee-Cybulski). A former Céline accessories designer, Johnny Coca, has been named artistic director of Mulberry.

There’s also a history of back room hires at Gucci itself. The most famous one? Tom Ford, who slogged it out for four years at Gucci before getting his place in the sun as creative director in 1994. Frida Giannini herself originally designed Gucci’s handbags before taking on womenswear and finally full control of the label’s output in 2006.

She departed earlier this year, almost two months ahead of previously-announced plans - in an unusual step, she was to present a final men’s and women’s collection for the house despite her departure having been confirmed. Maybe she found that whole situation too uncomfortable to see through? Or maybe Gucci were keen to usher in the new?

Out of the gaggle of back room hands that straggled at the top of Gucci’s catwalk on Monday, taking bows for an autumn/winter 2015 collection that had been completely reworked in the days - not weeks - after Giannini’ left, Michele stood out. With curly hair to his shoulders, you wondered if the bohemian air of the collection was, somehow, a reflection of his personal style? It emerged that it had been created under his leadership.

That winter menswear offering was certainly different to the direction taken by Giannini. Pointedly so: floaty rather than slick; trousers wide rather than narrow; blowsy and romantic and Florentine (where Gucci originated), rather than sharp and sixties and Roman (where Giannini is from - and, incidentally, Michele too).

It’s unclear if that hastily pulled-together collection, and the largely-positive press reaction to it, sealed the deal for Michele with Kering Chairman and CEO François-Henri Pinault and the new Gucci President and CEO Marco Bizzarri (himself only in the job since 1 January this year). Both released complimentary - and complementary - statements, Pinault commenting that Michele will “lead [Gucci] into an exciting new creative chapter,” and Bizzarri enforcing Michele’s appointment as “clear indication that the brand is ready to take a new direction.”

“New” is the important word there. That’s what Gucci are after: something new from someone new. Michele passed the first test - which seemed to be a time-trial. The Gucci womenswear show, presented in February, will be the real litmus.