Singularity is my love letter to gradient yarn. 💘
You know I love coming up with new solutions to vexing knitting problems. In this case the problem is that gradient yarn doesn't work so well for socks, because of the heel turn. A heel turn requires one to temporarily depart from the body of the sock. So if you're making socks with gradient yarn, either you work the heel in a separate strand, or you get a break in color right across the instep.
But! By exploiting the properties of bias-knit fabric, it is possible to create a heel worked entirely in the round, without a heel turn.
This concept has been with me for a long time because of a toy I played with as a kid. Starting with a straight form, you can create all kinds of shapes by cutting and rotating along diagonal axes. Most simply, you can create a 90-degree corner by making one diagonal cut and rotating one side.
For years I'd been mulling over this idea for a sock construction, but it wasn't until my friend Brenda (a.k.a. KBFF) was kvetching about the problem of [gradient yarn + socks] while making her Syncopation Socks (pictured above) that I had my a-ha moment. This construction would be the perfect solution!
I hope you'll check out the pattern. I am also working on other sock designs based on this principle. Because I love gradient yarn, and I love socks, combining these two loves makes me very happy!
BTW: You may have spotted Miter Joint in the current issue of knitty (Spring & Summer 2023). I'm glad to see I'm not the only designer who is captivated by the marriage of gradient yarn and bias construction. This is another example of a sock that uses bias construction to sidestep the heel turn.
