the Think Outside The SOX Contest Rules & Categories
Use your favorite sock yarn and win more! The Think Outside the SOX co-sponsors have devised 26 amateur categories to stimulate your creativity. Each category will be judged by the sponsoring company, and each winner will be awarded a $500 prize. That’s 26 more chances to win (21 yarn-specific categories and 5 non-yarn-specific categories)!
South West Trading Company
Unleash the Creativity: Forget how it should look—we want you to dream in technicolor, live wild, and break the rules! Show us what you can do with a sock when there are no boundaries. Design a sock using any technique, style, or idea in one color or many. Unleash YOUR creativity with Tofutsies sock yarn.
SOX Forever: Design a sock that excites us, motivates us, and makes us want to run for our needles! We’re passionate knitters & crocheters, and we want to see what you can do with our beloved sock yarn, Tofutsies. We’ll pick our favorite, a sock that we just can’t resist.
Colinette Yarns
Toddlers’ or Children’s Lace or Cable Socks: Create a pair of children’s or toddlers’ socks out of JitterBug in a lacy pattern, a cable pattern, or a combination of the two.
Adult Fair Isle: Create a pair of adult socks in a creative Fair Isle pattern using JitterBug.
Adult Lace Socks with Cuffs: Create a pair of socks in JitterBug with a lace pattern and a creative entrance (cuffs with buttons, beads, snaps, or embellishments OR wider openings with splits, etc.).
Mountain Colors Yarn
Cuff Down: Use Bearfoot yarn to create socks knit or crocheted from the cuff down and using an incredible stitch pattern: texture, lace, or surprise us!
Not Cuff Down: Use Bearfoot yarn to create socks that makes you dance! Knit or crochet them in any direction EXCEPT cuff down: toe up, heel outward, etc.
Regia
Twist and Shout: Show us what you can do with cables in a pair of socks made in any of the Regia 4-Ply yarns.
Get into the Groove: Show us your best textured socks made in any of the Regia 4-Ply yarns.
Toe Tapping: Show us your best socks pattern worked from the toe up made in any of the Regia 4-Ply yarns.
Best Foot Forward: Show us the socks that you would wear with clogs or sandals made in any of the Regia 6-ply yarns.
Universal Yarn, Inc.
Knitting in Colors: Use at least two colors of Pace or Pace Step in any colorwork technique (Fair Isle knitting, Intarsia knitting, Armenian knitting, etc.) or a combination of techniques together with any stitch pattern.
Most Masculine: Use any Ditto color or combination of colors to make socks that are a direct response to the relationship between the structure of a man’s foot and the environment around it.
Most Technical: Use any Fibra Natura Yummy color or combination of colors for a pair of technically innovative socks. We’re looking for the most innovative cast-on, heel-shaping, and toe-shaping techniques and the most innovative stitch pattern to create a textured and/or lacy effect.
Most Avant-Garde: Your Most Avant-Garde Socks will stretch the boundaries of the idea of a sock. Use any Marathon Socks color or a combination of colors, but be sure to change the existing pattern the yarn creates.
Skacel Collection
Socks to Dye For: This 2-step challenge uses the ready-to-dye sock yarns, Trekking Undyed or Trekking Pro Natura Undyed. First, dye your own colorway. And second, fashion a unique pair of socks from the newly dyed yarn. Or, knit/crochet your socks first and then dye them!
Step into the Future: Austermann’s Step, a sock yarn fused with Aloe Vera and Jojoba Oil, was the first of its kind. We want you to come up with another first. Allow your imagination to run wild, and show us your socks of the future!
Teddy Bear Footwear: Nothing evokes a sense of love, comfort, and security quite like a teddy bear. Your challenge is simple... create a sock in Fortissima Socka Teddy that captures these feelings. Think house slippers/socks, children’s socks, baby socks, and more.
It’s good to get Hosed!: When we see a man in a kilt, we don’t wonder “What is he wearing under it?”, but what he’s wearing WITH it. Make a pair of Kilt Hose that has us concentrating on his calves. The hose should fit a man’s shoe size from 9 to 12, and should pull up to 2 to 3 finger widths below the knee. Use any yarn from the Fortissima, Trekking, or Step families.
Cherry Tree Hill Yarn
Most Colorful Socks: Here’s your chance to go wild with color. We would love to see a pair of Fair isle or Intarsia socks using any number of colors (colorways, potlucks, or lotteries) of Supersock, Sockittome, Supersock DK, Cherub, and/or Louet Gems. Mix and match any of these to create the look you want.
Lace Socks: Show off your lacework in any of our Supersock Solids using any number of well-known, your own, or unknown lace motifs. Or, choose a potluck, or lottery hank in Supersock, Sockittome, Supersock DK, Cherub, or Louet Gems. Don’t be shy!
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Here are some sponsored non-yarn-specific categories that we also hope you’ll enjoy. Each of these categories will be judged by Cat Bordhi, Lucy Neatby, Sandi Rosner, and the Knitter’s Magazine editorial team. And each winner will be awarded a $500 prize.
Knitter’s Magazine
Inspired By Knitter’s Magazine: Show us how Knitter’s Magazine has inspired you. Make a pair of socks based on some project and/or technique you’ve seen in Knitter’s Magazine. Find your favorite design and sock it to us.
From Sheep to SOX: Spin your favorite fiber into your own unique sock yarn and then turn that yarn into a pair of socks with a twist.
KnitU.com
Best in the Universe: Members of KnitU, this one’s for you only. We’re looking for the most universal Outside the SOX socks—innovative, but also knittable/crochetable, understandable, and adaptable—a sock that will be the talk of KnitU.
STITCHES Knitting Expos
Under 18: You are not yet 18, today’s young knitter/crocheter who will be tomorrow’s expert. Show us socks that make YOU want to wear them.
XRX Books
XMAS SOX: This is the only category where one sock is fine—no need to make a pair. You decide what would be the ideal stocking for Santa to fill.
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And we also have a 27th category... setup just for the Pros in our industry. This non-yarn-specific will be judged by Cat Bordhi, Lucy Neatby, Sandi Rosner, and the Knitter’s Magazine editorial team. And the winner will be awarded a $500 prize.
From addi Turbo © by Skacel—the official knitting needles and crochet hooks for the Think Outside The SOX contest
The Pros: If you are paid to knit or crochet, teach knitting or crochet, design knit or crochet garments, or sell yarn, you are defined as a professional. This is the category you must enter. Since professionals are the idea people in our industry, this category is open-ended. We’re looking for socks that build on your skills (techniques that have gone before) but also take the yarn world at least one step further into the 21st century.
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You can download the complete official rules & categories and/or just the entry form for the Think Outside The SOX contest (in PDF or JPEG format) on the Rules and Categories page of this website.
You can view FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions) about the the Think Outside The SOX contest on the FAQs page of this website.
