The Japanese brand still shaking up sportswear

Back in March, an abandoned north London amphitheatre provided the backdrop for a troupe of dancers to swing and contort in an explosive perfomance of street and ballet, choreographed by FKA twigs collaborator Ryan Heffington. It was all in celebration of a new collaboration between Nike and Japanese innovators sacai, the brainchild of Chitose Abe, who got her start in fashion at the avant-garde Japanese design houses Comme des Garçons and Junya Watanabe.

Now sacai and Nike are back for part two with a summer collection fronted by Dazed cover star and Tennessee tomboy Binx Walton. For the cult brand that sets out to create "empowering clothes without the power-suit,” teaming up with Nike means the designer gets to put a girl power twist on iconic sport silhouettes, using sacai’s signature paneling and pleating to reinventing archive athletic pieces. “There is boldness to the colour that feels very true to the world of sportswear, yet it is a feminine, playful palette that feels authentic to sacai,”  Abe says. "I was inspired by the palette that I saw in the Nike archives and looked at expressing it in a new way.”

The NikeLab x sacai summer collection launches globally at nike.com/NikeLab and in select NikeLab stores on June 11.