Design a Sock competition - the samples!

Put your minds back to 2012; I know, it’s a stretch, but in that year we ran our fab competition which gave our lovely customers the chance to design a ‘Dare to Wear’ range.

Six designs were chosen as the winners, mocked up by our designers and sent off to be made into samples – so we could get an idea of what they looked like as actual socks.

The final samples are now back and have been approved, which means the socks can be manufactured then eventually sold at SOCKSHOP!

Below are the original designs, the designers' interpretations of them, and finally, the socks themselves. 

‘Holey socks', which was chosen as the overall winning design of the competition, is very similar to the original design. The only noticeable difference is the shape of the hole, which has been given a more ‘jagged’ look.  

Kate’s final sock has hardly changed from the original drawing. Although difficult to see in the photo, the sparkly elements made from lurex really stand out, and the colours chosen complement each other well.

The main change from Kane’s original design was to flip where the caricature and text were placed from the side of the sock to the front. As you can see in the sample sock on the right, changing to a 'flat-board' design (as it's known) has helped to create plenty of space to fit in the character and the writing.

I’m not sure if you can tell from the images above, but the final sock for Lynn’s design ended up being slightly brighter than originally planned.  After receiving the first sample back from the factory, the designers felt like the background colour didn’t pop out as much, and so tweaked it slightly. 

As you can see from the pictures, Patricia’s design has hardly changed from the original to the final sock. The face of the mouse has been altered slightly, but that was only to give it a more ‘cartoonish’ quality.

Out of all the winning designs, Margaret's has been altered the most by the designers. They really liked the strap line - the idea that you would give instructions for what to do with the dirty socks - but felt like the rest of the design didn't really fit in with the 'Dare to Wear' collection. 

The middle image was Margaret’s concept reimagined, and the final sock stays very true to this design. The post-it note-style graphic really stands out against the black – creating a fun and quirky sock which we hope people will love.