Designing Leotards With an Eye Towards Comfort
Alina Khoo on AK Dancewear’s Mission
By Madison Huizinga, DWC Blog Editor
Photo by Marlen Alimanov Photography
At one time or another, most dancers have worn an uncomfortable, ill-fitting leotard. Donning awkwardly fitting dancewear can be so distressing that it can feel like it has real impacts on one’s dancing. If you’re not feeling confident, how can you expect to move confidently? That’s why Alina Khoo has created AK Dancewear with the motivation to produce flattering and comfortable dancewear that helps dancers feel their best in the studio.
Alina grew up in Penang, a Malaysian state located on the northwest coast of Peninsular Malaysia. She began taking ballet classes around age nine to help correct a posture problem she was facing. Alina trained under the Royal Academy of Dance syllabus as a child, continuing until her posture was eventually corrected. She stopped dancing when she went to college. “It was very difficult,” Alina says of quitting dance, as her family desired her to focus her attention on pursuing a conventionally “stable” or “secure” career. She ended up traveling to the United States to pursue an engineering degree and eventually secured a technical information job.
“All along, I enjoyed being in the audience,” Alina says, sharing that she loved viewing as many dance performances as she could. At one point, she began especially missing dancing herself. Alina chose to take some dance classes at a local college and was encouraged by her instructor to pursue it further. So, she decided to earn a teaching certification and get involved with the dance scene little by little, beginning with teaching freelance and as a substitute for friends. After having her second child, Alina decided to leave her corporate job, directing more of her attention towards raising her children and dancing. She’s been dancing and teaching with a local company ever since, getting involved with its shows throughout the season.
“It’s always good to find that inner connection,” Alina says of rediscovering dance. She shares that the moment she returned to dancing, the technical knowledge felt like it came back quickly. “Just walking into a studio, I find that connection, and that security is like a sanctuary for me.”
Alina has always felt like she doesn’t have a “typical” ballerina body, as most of the dancewear products she purchases off the shelf don’t fit comfortably for her. “I do a lot of mending,” she says of the dancewear she purchases. Fortunately, sewing is second nature to Alina, as her grandmother sewed everything growing up. Alina began buying clothing items, including leotards she liked and altering them to fit her body. Eventually, people in her life began asking her where she was purchasing her clothes.
She began selling her custom creations, mainly to friends and parents from her dance studio and later on Etsy. After attending a dance workshop in New York City and receiving inquiries about her leotards from even more dancers, Alina got even more into creating dancewear. She and her husband decided to look more into the process of creating a brand.
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AK Dancewear launched in 2018 with a mission to never compromise on product quality. “We strive to make non-revealing, high quality and comfortable to wear garments,” the brand’s website reads. “Whatever I do, I will never compromise how comfortable the leotard [is],” Alina says. “Dancewear is for people,” she says, implying that dancers should feel secure in their leotards, and not like they are being “worn” by the garment. This is a philosophy Alina carries throughout her brand.
In addition to focusing on comfort, Alina is greatly inspired by nature when it comes to selecting colors and design concepts for her various leotard lines. For example, the “Caribbean” line of leotards contains various shades of blue and green tones, inspired by the vivid colors of the Caribbean skyline. The “Rose Garden” line of leotards, skirts, scrunchies, and face masks was inspired by the Tyler Rose Garden, in Tyler, Texas, the largest public collection of roses in the United States. Alina recalls taking her parents to the garden and them being enamored by the masses of blooming flowers. “It just inspired me a lot…I always remember [that] trip,” Alina shares. “The new things that I’m going to come out with were inspired by an experience, somewhere that I go, [or] something that I feel a connection to.” She points out that design is largely subjective, so she feels drawn to create what connects to her as an individual.
Alina identifies parallels between choreographing dances and designing leotards. Both artistic endeavors involve the need to learn foundational skills, like basic dance techniques and sewing. After you get a hang of the core semantics, you’re free to create whatever you want.
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Alina is uninterested in putting the majority of her energy into producing copious amounts of new products, rather she seeks to lean into what works for the dancer and expand from there. If she notices a leotard cut that most dancers like, she’s interested in seeing how she can improve upon it and create new iterations.
In 2022, AK Dancewear plans on releasing new collections and introducing a new fabric that provides a lot of support to dancers, in addition to its signature AKxtra™ design technique. Within the existing leotard collections at AK Dancewear, Alina loves creating variety in terms of color, design, and theme, so customers can also look forward to that in the coming year as well. Alina is also looking more into producing dancewear for men, as she has two sons who dance and struggle to find attire that works for them. “It’s heartbreaking that we don’t have enough for them,” she shares. She looks forward to being able to help bridge the gap in men’s dancewear in the future and look more into producing unisex dancewear that provides support to all dancers.
In the larger dance world, Alina is pushing for dancers to receive greater compensation for their work. “We should definitely value dancers more as artists,” she says. Alina points out that she makes an effort to involve local dancers in her business, specifically with photoshoots, as a way to move towards this change on the local level. “As a community, we should move forward with that - first, by paying our dancer friends,” she says. “This is an expertise that you’re tapping into, and you should pay [for the] expertise.”
