Inspired by dance

When fashion designer Rick Owens replaced runway models with a plus-sized African-American step-dancing team for his spring show in Paris, it created a sensation but also served to reinforce fashion's long connection with dance.

The Paris-based Californian, whose clothes are stocked in Havana, Donnybrook, is famous for sharp leather and knit jackets. A new book, Dance & Fashion, edited by Valerie Steele, chief curator of the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York, shows how fashion designers from Dior and Balenciaga to Comme des Garcons and Valentino have been inspired by dancers' adorned and animated bodies. Featuring essays by ten fashion experts, the book covers the liberating effects of the tango to the influence of ballet in Japanese girl culture.

Published by Yale University Press, the book is lavishly illustrated with historical and contemporary images and will appeal to fashion and dance aficionados. Deirdre McQuillan