Up and down the land, the same mystery woman stands 10ft tall on billboards, peeks out from shop windows, poses in catalogues and dances provocatively on television screens in a bestselling set of Marks & Spencer underwear.

She is obviously doing something right: last week M&S announced that it had doubled predicted sales growth, that its shares are at their highest for eight years and that staff would be sharing a £70m bonus.

As if helping to transform the fortunes of one high street giant was not enough, the same model is also on page after page of the current Next Directory, meaning that for millions of Britons she is more of a national icon than Kate Moss.

She is the face — and body — of Britain in 2006 and, unnamed and generally unknown, begs the questions: who is she and what makes her the choice as everywoman for modern Britain?

Apart from the perfect figure and sculpted features, Noémie Lenoir, 26, embodies the cosmopolitan nature of Britain in a way that is not immediately obvious. One attribute is that she, like 4.6m other Brits in the last census, is of multicultural descent. Like 27% of parents she is also a single mother. She even has an on/off relationship with the Chelsea star Claude Makelele, making her a thoroughly Brit chav princess.

Behind all that lies an even more telling fact: she is not British at all. Ask Lenoir what a chav is and she replies: “I’ve really no idea.” Who is David Cameron? “I’ve heard the name. I think he’s a politician.” Have you ever eaten Marmite? “No.”

Lenoir has a good excuse for being baffled. It turns out that the new face of Britain is actually French. Like thousands of migrant workers from her homeland she is discovering that Britain is a hot destination for the young, talented and career-hungry of old Europe frustrated with the sclerotic labour laws of their home countries.

While we Brits may moan about our lot, the migrants from Italy, Germany and France put things in a proper perspective: many, such as Lenoir, are escaping here attracted by the promise of an easy job.

France is suffering the biggest exodus since its revolution in 1789 and the number of its countrymen registered as living in Britain has more than doubled from 44,000 in 1993 to 91,630 in 2005. The real figure is believed to be well over twice this, however, as most expatriates do not register with the consulate. This means that the French are fourth on the list of expatriates sending money earned in the UK back home to their families, with only India, China and Mexico ahead of them.

The Italians are looking on in envy, too. Last week Italy was in political turmoil after its general election ended in a wafer-thin victory for Romano Prodi, the centre-left challenger, over Silvio Berlusconi, the flamboyant business tycoon. With rising taxes, stagnant wages and an uncertain political future, many young Italians have also been seeking a better life in the UK.

Even in Germany, once the continent’s economic powerhouse, a similar problem has emerged. With unemployment standing at 12%, twice that of the UK, Christian Schmitz, a web designer from Ulm who moved to Britain 10 years ago to study, is no longer tempted to return.

“I have many friends in Berlin who are having difficulty finding work,” he said, “and others are scared of losing their jobs in case they don’t find another one.” Crippling labour costs in Germany stifle business, he believes.

Véronique Thabault, a 40- year-old bookshop owner who moved here from Paris seven years ago, said: “It is much more difficult to find work in France than Britain, even if you have good qualifications. There is more flexibility in Britain, and once you get a job there are better prospects for climbing the ladder.”

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