Noemie Lenoir, the stunning French supermodel know for M&S adverts, is recovering in a Paris hospital after an alleged suicide attempt.

Lenoir, who has become a household name in the UK, apparently tried to kill herself while at the house of her former boyfriend, French footballer Claude Makelele, by a potentially lethal combination of alcohol and pills.

Lenoir is most well-known as the £10 million former face and body of Marks & Spencer. Lenoir, 30, has also fronted fashion campaigns for Next, Victoria’s Secret, l’Oreal and Gap. She is presently in a high-profile relationship with Carl Hirschmann, the controversial Swiss millionaire.

The model was discovered near the home of Makelele, in a forest on the outskirts of Paris. It is believed that she had been drinking a large volume of alcohol – thought to be spirits – and taken several types of drugs while she was staying at the footballer’s home, though no details of exactly what was taken have as yet been released. Makelele, at the time, was in Paris to accept a footballing lifetime achievement award.

Earlier in the evening, Lenoir had telephoned an ambulance, advising operators that she had become very ill, but then called back to cancel the dispatch. She was later seen heading groggily in the direction of the woods, where she was found by another passer-by who was out for a walk with his dog.

She later regained consciousness at the hospital, but is still showing signs of what medical staff described as an obvious attempt to hurt herself.

Sales in the UK’s retail sector improved greatly between January and February, but there are two retailers reporting a significant rise in profits for last year, during which the world was suffering a recession. Next, the second-biggest fashion retailer in the UK, has reported an 18% increase in profit, while B&Q owner Kingfisher, the largest European home improvement chain, has reported a 50% rise.

Next says that pretax profits increased £505.3 million, while sales totaled £3,406 million, for 2009. The company says that the cutback in consumer spending during the recession wasn’t as bad as they thought it would be.

Next chairman John Barton said that they faced an unstable economy at the beginning of the year, with falling sales and the weakness of the pound against the euro and US dollar. Despite this, consumers continued to spend on the High Street, the company continued. The fashion chain also said that like-for-like sales increased for the first time in 5 years. However, this year’s outlook is still uncertain, depending on government policy, they added.

Kingfisher, however, reported much better results, with profits reaching £566 million, which is up £547 million (excluding one-off gains). This is almost a 50% increase from a year ago. The company’s UK businesses, which include Screwfix and B&Q, had 64.5% increases in profits. They also own businesses in Poland, France and China.

Kingfisher chief executive Ian Cheshire said that business showed a strong performance improvement with most of the business resulting in profitable growth. He added that they remain cautious about consumer demand across Europe, but are confident that growth will continued.