Patrick Scallon has joined French fashion house Lemaire as its new global communications director, WWD has learned.

It is understood Scallon started this week at the brand, lead by Christophe Lemaire and Sarah-Linh Tran and prized for its understated clothing and croissant-shaped bags.

Among his immediate projects will be an exhibition at Lemaire’s boutique in Tokyo’s Ebisu neighborhood, and prepping for its next runway show during men’s fashion week in Paris in January.

A discreet and respected communications professional with a very short résumé in fashion, Scallon is best known for his long career at Maison Margiela and more recently at Dries Van Noten, where he logged an eventful 14 years as communications director.

Since exiting Dries Van Noten a few years ago, Scallon has been working as an independent consultant and mentor in fashion communications strategy, also lecturing occasionally and sharing his views about creative content on podcasts.

Scallon is also well known for his 15-year stint at Maison Margiela, from 1993 to 2008, working alongside the iconoclastic founder, Martin Margiela, and functioning as communications head, the voice of the house, and ultimately its art director for communications.

A native of Ireland, Scallon graduated from University College Dublin with an arts degree, going on to work at as a communications trainee at the European Commission in Brussels, a city where he spent nearly a decade working mainly in communications, speech writing, lobbying and consulting for public or private sector entities.

For his contributions to the fashion industry, Scallon was awarded the Chevaliers des Arts et des Lettrés by the French Ministry of Culture in 2019.