Garter-top, rib-bottom tube socks

[cimorene]

I just finished making these Simply Irresistible Socks, Worsted by Christie Archer. I saw the pattern go by in my Ravelry friends feed and was instantly intrigued, because I've never seen a sock like this before: they don't have any heel at all, they're a straight tube, but because the top of the foot is worked in garter stitch and the back in 1x1 rib, they contract and stretch to fit the foot anyway, at least, going by the photos.

Even though the weather is definitely warm now, I cast on a pair of these in heavy worsted wool, boot sock weight, because that was the yarn I had around when I was waiting for the yarn for my next project (a chunky cotton eyelet cardigan - Corran Cardigan by Rebecca Clow). I finished the second sock today and wore them around the house for a couple of hours and they do indeed seem to work as advertised, for me! I'm looking forward to making a longer pair and a pair in fingering weight sock yarn after I've done some more seasonally appropriate summer knitting.

Comments

[james]

Those socks look very interesting! I would like to know how comfortable the heel part is, as I tend to be very sensitive about the socks I wear and almost never manage to knit socks I want to actually wear. (Especially when worn in shoes or boots, so that the ribbing is being pressed against one's skin. Can you feel the texture?)

[cimorene]

Well, I don't suffer from the same problem - I rarely wear hand-knitted socks against the skin, though; I have some fine merino socks and some merino terry socks which are finer and warmer respectively than any of our hand-knitted ones, although in both cases, uglier and less durable. When it comes to thick wool boot socks, like most people in Finland, I wear them throughout the winter with other socks underneath. On the occasions when I have worn fingering-weight wool against the feet with shoes instead of for lounging around the house, I found the texture of stitches a bit distracting but not really uncomfortable.

The heel definitely is more snug than a regular hand-knitted sock, but it has a slight tendency to slide down towards the toe, at least on me - but this is probably partly due to the shape of the foot and ankle, I suppose.

How distinctly one feels the texture and also how uncomfortable that feeling is also probably varies a lot. A softer and less tightly-wound yarn in a luxurious blend like with yak, cashmere, and/or alpaca would make it much harder to feel the stitches, although the socks may pay for this by sliding down all the time (which is why I eventually gave up on making more socks out of Sandnes Garn's Spøt, which feels pretty heavenly on my feet - they just don't have enough elasticity compared to wool... merino is still very elastic, but the very fineness of the fiber means that it has to be tightly wound in order to have durability, which is important in socks, so while it is very soft, it's also springy and creates good stitch definition).

[james]

This is useful information, thank you!

[viggorlijah]

Those are so cool! What gauge did you get for them? I would love to try that. I just bought some sock yarn in bold blue stripes and I want to do the plain Hermione socks to start my dream of a hand knit sock drawer now I wear socks several times a week. Would you recommend doing them first in worsted or could I use the sock weight yarn? I wonder how to reinforce ribbing…

[cimorene]

I have eight knit stitches (and eight purl ones hidden between) per 5 cm in 1x1 rib with my standard worsted sock yarn. The socks are 38 stitches around in my size, which is within a normal range, but a bit less than usual. The pattern has instructions for choosing your size based on the circumference of your foot - the diagram has it measured around the arch portion. The smallest size calls for 34st and the largest 54st in this worsted yarn - my finished sock, unstretched, is about 2/3 the width (easier to measure than circumference) of my foot circumference (8 cm across the sock: 12 cm foot circ).

But because of the simplicity of this pattern, it should be very easy to adjust up and down for other gauge. The garter rib section on the top of the foot is worked over the center 13 out of 19st in my size, which amounts to three rib stitches on each side (somewhere between ½cm and 1cm in unstretched vertical ribbing), and the ribbing simply continues all the way around to the bottom. The pattern, written from the top down, is just a tube that starts with a bit more than 1 cm of plain 1x1 ribbing before the garter section is begun, and then you just keep going in that pattern until it's time to decrease for the toes, when you switch to stockinette for the toe section. Obviously this would work equally well in toe-up construction.

I started with heavier yarn for convenience, and because they'd be done faster - plus I guess that's less time wasted if they turned out not to work for me! But they are pretty nice and easy to make, very meditative, because of not having to pay attention to how far you've come, yet more interesting than plain stockinette, since you switch from rib to garter each round. But given your climate, perhaps fingering weight socks would make more sense! And I definitely want to make some of those next. Those 'luxury' merino sock yarns really DO feel nicer on the skin, which seems annoying and unfair to me, but now that I have some I like them so much better than my other socks that I want more pairs.

As for heel reinforcement, I have never seen the fabled thin plastic/nylon heel reinforcement thread mentioned in the Elizabeth Zimmerman books for sale, I've just made the whole sock with yarn that had synthetic in it already. I did wonder if they would wear differently from other socks, but I haven't had a chance to find out yet since they've had very little wear. I haven't even blocked them yet!

[james]

I don't know if it's just not available in Finland, but they sell 100% nylon thread as "invisible thread" while "sock reinforcement thread" is mostly wool blended with nylon (so you have to try to match the colors.) I've seen the nylon invisible thread in sewing stores as well as places like amazon.

[cimorene]

Oh okay, maybe I have simply not looked in the right place - I haven't seen it in the sock yarn section of the yarn store.

[viggorlijah]

Getting worsted is actually hard here because we mostly have DK weights for wool and anything bigger is going to be acrylic or cotton. You really can’t beat wool for socks and the nylon wool is so good. Even here, wool socks are more comfy and in Finland they must be so cozy at that gauge.

I remember in the 90s when I’d just learned to knit being able to buy a spool of nylon to strand along with my wool and the specialty sock wools were a new cool thing!

I learned to reinforce heels - like there’s a very dense slipped stitch rib that can be used for the heel and toes that wears better and other ways people do it so the socks are easier to darn later. Those are traditional because hand knit socks were all socks and I guess people got annoyed with having to repair them versus our luxury of hand knit socks now.

Thank you so much for the clear descriptions I am going to try those after I finish the brioche hat now I’m confident I can adapt the gauge. But I am wondering about using the slipped ribbing, hmm.

[cimorene]

Oh yeah, I've used slip stitch heel on many socks before, but I don't think it would work here because the ribbing being able to contract and expand is a design feature, it's necessary for fit. Adding another yarn alongside through the heel area might work though!

[cimorene]

You should be able to use dk and simply use a few more stitches, that's not far off!

[cimorene]

My coziest socks were a really squishy alpaca blend, but it didn't have enough wool to keep it elastic and they would just fall down. So I'm definitely on a quest for a new luxury sock that will feel softer than the merino sock yarn which is my current #2 after giving up on that alpaca blend yarn.

[laurajv]

hmm, those socks look nice. and I do need new socks.