2011 Gifts | Dance

Assolutely fabulous The luxury coffee-table books published by Assouline�protected by linen clamshell boxes�often cost more than coffee tables themselves. At $750, Ballets Russes is no exception. This 220-page tome by Andr� Tubeuf, with 180 illustrations on cotton paper, surveys a time when Coco Chanel designed for dances with backdrops painted by Matisse or Picasso. L�on Bakst�s costume sketches, of Nijinsky and other stars, are some of the most gorgeous in dance history. Swoon. Available online at assouline.com.

Time savior Anyone who�s ever created choreography to recorded music is all too familiar with a maddening time-suck: scrolling forward and backward through a sound file to find the beginning of the sequence you�re working on. Pioneer has heard your cries of anguish and released STEEZ Boomboxes in three sizes ($299-$499). Designed for dancers and dance teachers, they allow for cue tagging, tempo tweaking and more. Available at pioneerelectronics.com.

Body on We�ve only just begun to see the implications for dance study possible through motion-capture technologies developed for Xbox 360. For now, the focus is mostly on fun: Pick up Dance Central 2 ($50) and start smiling�and sweating. Available at GameStop, 120 S Halsted St and other locations (312-243-1008).