Niqkita's Sock Journal

These just in…

Pretty basic, kinda long, 85% cotton, 15% spandex, totally comfy

Solid colors = all the way from the tops to the tippy toes
Wear ‘em high or scrunch em down, they’re totally cute cuffed above the knees
What are they? Super Basics!!!

unlike the Super Ms they fit nicely around the ankles like the O Basics.
This is our first run of them
…and they’re so new we don’t have our pictures together yet.
But I know that won’t stop the most dedicated among you from trying them because you already know what the colors look like. We’ll be getting more colors and the larger feet in anyday now, yes, that’s right, the same stretchy feet the O Basics have in the usual size and a larger size.
I’ve been testing my pair for a few days now and during a warm spell besides, not always the best time to test thigh high anythings, but I fell in love anyway. They are fully convertible for lots of different moods or outfits or coverage needs and lighter weight than the M Stockings & Long Cuffables. The top stretch is very good: everyone here could pull them up, though like most socks they don’t go as high on larger legs (we’re adding a few inches in the length of the larger footed ones, I don’t think that’s in the first run, but will be in the next batch & I’ll know for sure as soon as they arrive). One last thing before we start the open sock thoughts discussion: the cuffs are new and improved since the O Basics began, they just have three inches of ribbing at the tops with increased stretch, I think most of you are going to love them ~:)

Yes, as may only be apparent to the truly dedicated among you I took a week off to visit NYC. Since I got a bad case of jet lag I haven’t quite gotten back into the swing of things since my return. But soon I will be adding new items again and embarking on many a fun venture for summer and beyond. More about that soon!
til then, here are some highlights from my week away…

When in New York I always visit our beloved sock girl EG,
she is a hostess extraordinaire and always makes my stay like a trip home.
She’s been telling me for years that we should do a street fair in the village to get our name firmly in the dreams of her fellow New Yorkers so this trip was planned around my checking out the street fair for myself…

On my first morning in town we headed to Magnolia Bakery to try some of those cupcakes we’ve heard so much about. While I worked at Powell’s cookbook store I often drooled over the pictures in their cookbook and must say they are indeed fantastic little cakes! not that there is a shortage of fancy cupcakes to be had in NYC or that you couldn’t perhaps do better yourself, but I was not disappointed.

I was joined over the weekend by Sock Dreams Head of Marketing & Planning, B and her cousin K, who has excellent navigation skills and got us everywhere we needed to be & back without so much as a doubt in her voice that we were headed for the correct train, exit ect. You see, our darling little Vel has been under the weather lately so we couldn’t take EG all over town for our meetings this time and my own navigation skills outside Portland suck. Don’t worry, Vel’s on the mend and seemed to enjoy every moment of the attention he was getting with all the girls cooing over him.

Yes, there were other business ventures to be had in the city for us last week…

among them a meeting high up in the Empire State Building to finalize a private label deal I’ve been working on. I’m not going to discuss the details, but it involves one of the brands we’ve sold since the beginning in a limited amount of colors with a few changes to make some of them uniquely our own, and of course, our own label!

Also enjoyed, but not photographed, was a day in SoHo to visit some of my favorite boutiques for inspiration because we are getting very close to signing that elusive lease I’ve been dreaming of…

Some days I just like a simple cotton sock between me and my fav boots and while Sock Dreams has no shortage of comfy cotton socks to choose from, one of my current fav’s is the Organic Nuby. Short & to the point these little socks are made here in the US with US grown organic cotton that is soft, nicely padded around the feet and just enough spandex in the tops to stay up without digging in. The capris are from Via Spiga and just happen to be the comfiest and prettiest lacy capris I’ve ever had. The fit around the tummy was most excellent, didn’t dig in to my squishy parts (yes, we all have them) and stayed down below my knees with their nice flat/wide cuffs that barely leave a mark when removed. I’ve been so impressed by the Via Spigas that I plan to bring in more of their styles this fall/winter. Til then, if you fit into their small/medium or medium/large range I highly recommend these!

(little miss Lola assessing my set up before I started taking pictures)

These are the perfect lightweight sock for when it starts getting hot outside. They fit my feet well, the black w/red seem to be a tiny bit larger than the other pairs I have, but not by too much. Lots of colours to choose from, my favourites are the black or white with coloured chevrons.

My Dad likes the boy version of these. Sorry no photo of Dad this time lol ;P

When the first batch of solid colored Cronert OTKs were a hit I decided to order every other color I could. It had to be a large order as they are not readily available in this country at this time of the year. It arrived from Germany last week and Simone promptly brought them over for us just as we were down to our last few black pairs
~now that’s what I call perfect timing!


There were minor glitches with the order, no ecru til next time and the light orange are only in small (I’ve seen the small stretch to fit large feet though so if you really like the shade you might want to try them anyway). I’d love to see a better range of colors; four of these are quite similar but I’m sure there will be more in the future.

from top down: Wine, Violet, Aubergine & Pink
The wine & violet were our big favorites of these, both are gorgeous. The violet is very dark, not the least bit bright, like a black plum in the heat of summer. The wine seemed extra soft to me and are my personal pick of the batch…

We’ve had a ton of positive feedback about the fit and quality of these. If you can fit them in to your budget they will be a wise investment worthy of your finest shoes…

In the picture they were the prettiest pink & appeared to stay up without the help of a garter belt. When they arrived they were a stronger shade of pink, closer to salmon than baby, baby salmon perhaps? I signed them off to Janey to shoot on one of her models and they reported back that they don’t stay up for anything & start snagging the moment you touch them. So I decided to give them a try myself…

Out of the package they didn’t have the cheap feel I expected from such easily snagged stockings. I pulled them up with ease, so far so good, but the back seam wasn’t quite straight so I eased them back down below the knees and carefully pulled them back up paying special attention to the seam alignment. Perfect, but wait, where’d that snag come from? I didn’t even feel a slight tug on my nails, and that tiny hole, that wasn’t there a minute ago. Next I noticed that the heels were on my ankles, a quick adjustment fixed that, but they really weren’t going to stay up for any amount of walking without something holding them up so I added a pair of the panty garters, minimal support with those and it was plenty, plus, they looked perfect together!

Now that I’ve got them figured out I love them! they have plenty of stretch for the longer legged among us and with minor adjusting you should be able to make the cuban foot-bed work for a women’s size 8 up to a 12 (men’s 10), give or take a bit depending on how picky you are. I highly recommend using a wash bag and some special hosiery wash plus a pair of gloves that cover your fingers to help prevent snags from cuticles and nails. Though my pair didn’t suffer any additional damage after the initial incidents.

We might just run out of these this week, but will be ordering more immediately!

They are officially lime green, but when I went looking for somewhere to take a better picture of them I noticed a resemblance to the lilies in the back yard at work. And I don’t really find them to be the shade of limes anyway. They are a nice green, they were too pretty to take off, so spring-y and happy, they even made my toes smile because they are just so comfy! The toes actually fit (as do the Feelmax toes, but these fit just a bit better) even my smaller footed friends find the toes actually fit them (as do my larger footed friends!). In the past we’ve only carried the Toe Toes sporadically, but we’re going to try and keep them stocked this time around so I’m putting in another order today. Did you see their crazy arm\leg warmers? Super furry and really fun! The green melange would be extra fun with lime/lily toe socks!!!

Before we add more socks there are a few new tights…
These are Via Spiga’s Maxi Rib semi sheer tights.
No denier listing on the label, maybe about 25? …tattoos are going to show, scars most likely too, bruises and freckles not so much. The ribs go all the way to the tippy tips of the toes, but the panty area is brief style (no cotton liner either). This is our first Via Spiga item, I also have a cute lacy capri to test this week from them (because it is *finally* almost lacy capri season). No fancy smell with these, just fancy legs.
…plus, they’re made in the USA.

These Vertical Tights are a really sexy pair of tights. Everytime I open one of their packages, “The LeVante Scent” fills my nose. I can’t decide if I like it or not, or even if it is perfume or the smell of the fabric, so I tend to sniff them alot trying to make up my mind what that smell is all about. I imagine their factory must be thick with this scent and their workers mildly delirious from the smell & making such fabulous stockings all the time. After a washing the perfume is gone, so I’m thinking it’s just a selling point. If you are sensitive to scents you will want to wash these before wearing.

The panty area is “tanga style” instead of the brief/boy short style like most American pantyhose are. Which pleases me greatly as I never found the brief style to have an advantage unless I got the super-duper control top turniquets. So this tanga style ads to the sexiness. I used to like pantyhose, but the square boxy brief has always been so unattractive that I gave up on pantyhose and switched over to tights. But these are really sexy and are winning me back. If you never thought of pantyhose as sexy, I bet it’s because you haven’t worn tanga style before.

I’m sorry I’m too modest to show a pic of the tanga panty. So, here’s a close up of the stripe detail instead. It’s a nice little pattern, and every few lines, the rest are a normal kind of stripe.

Wikipedia says

“The sheerness of the garment, expressed as a numerical ‘denier’/'dtex’, ranges from 3 (extremely rare, very thin, barely visible) to 15 (standard sheer) up to 30 (semi opaque) until 70 (opaque).”

These are 20 denier.
Which is pretty sheer and will clearly show all tattoos & booboos.

The vertical stripes are very flattering. They make your legs look longer and slimmer. I’m 5′3″ & I got size 2 which fit me fine. These are the glace colour which is your standard nude pantyhose colour. Tube style feet like most hosiery. And these will probably run if you’re rough on your hosiery. They are very sexy and one style I want all the colours of. I really love the Verticale Tights.