After much speculation following the departure of Claire Waight Keller, Pringle of Scotland announced this week that Balenciaga ready-to-wear designer Alistair Carr will be joining them as their new design director.

Having already appointed I-D as their media partner and commissioned graphic designer of the moment David Shrigley to create an online brand video, it seems the addition of Alistair Carr to the team is another step in Pringle’s mission to inject some much needed edginess into the brand.

A 2003 graduate of Central St Martins, Alistair Carr made a name for himself during his degree as a corsetiere for Mr Pearl before going on to work at some of the fashion industry’s big hitters including Marni and Chloé. The unassuming and heavily tattooed designer finally settled as head of the design team at Balenciaga under Nicolas Ghesquière where he became famous for his cutting edge sportswear inspired designs.

Carr will be showing his first collection for Pringle in September this year and it will exciting to see how he will fuse his stringently contemporary design style with that of the label’s classic. Change is afoot at Pringle and I for one will be waiting with anticipation!