The daughter of Lionel Judah Levi (1882–1960) and his wife, Dora Jane Ann, née MacDonald (1896–1966). Her father was a carpet merchant and fine art dealer who specialized in French antique furniture and kept a shop in Mount Street, Mayfair.
Zoë Levi was educated at Francis Holland School in Regent's Park and at a finishing school in Switzerland. After the Second World War she worked for the society portrait photographer Vivienne (Florence Entwistle) before establishing her own studio in Netherton Grove at the Fulham end of the King's Road.
Dominic was the "chosen" photographer of Maria Callas, Rudolf Nureyev, Margot Fonteyn, Laurence Olivier and Maggie Smith. Her career, which started around 1957, coincided with the launch of the English Stage Company at the Royal Court in London, which she documented, and, a few years later, the coming of the Royal Shakespeare Company and the National Theatre.
(Sources: Michael Coveney and Guardian Obituary and the The Stage 22 March 1990)