Luxury department store operator Harvey Nichols Group has appointed Maninder Gill, former legal director of Northern & Shell, as its first-ever head of legal.

Gill joined the board of the retailer as legal director and company secretary earlier this year after last year leaving publishing and broadcasting company Northern & Shell, which counts Express newspapers and OK! magazine among its titles.

During his seven years at Northern & Shell, which is owned by high-profile media baron Richard Desmond, Gill led the publisher's law suit against Hello! magazine for using snatched photos of the wedding of film stars Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta Jones. In 2003 the High Court awarded £1m in damages to OK! magazine but in May 2005 the decision was overturned after Hello! launched an appeal.

The news will be of interest to Harvey Nichols' advisers such as Macfarlanes, which advised on its delisting from the London Stock Exchange in February 2003, and Norton Rose, which advised it on the £69m sale of a 49.9% stake in the company to Broad Gain (UK) in October 2002.

At Northern & Shell, Gill used a range of firms including Addleshaw Goddard, Ashurst and Rosenblatt.

Harvey Nichols has stores in London, Manchester, Edinburgh, Birmingham and Leeds, as well as in Dublin, Hong Kong, Saudi Arabia and Dubai.