Khaki hose ... again

[Tobus]

Perhaps dying a pair of the oft-maligned white/cream hose?

I have done that before. Dyeing a pair of hose can be tricky, depending on the type of material it's made from. With all the synthetic materials in modern hose, they don't take the dye as well as one would hope. Below is a pair of cream hose that I dyed with dark (bottle) green Rit dye. This was as dark as they would get. I'm not unhappy with the final result, but it wasn't what I thought it would be. If dyeing a pair of white/cream hose, it would probably be worth making sure they have a high wool content, or even cotton. But the less synthetic fibers, the better.

And on that note, I may actually take the pair of oatmeal/stone hose that I mentioned in a previous post and try to dye them a little darker. Maybe even just tea-stain them or something. I thought I would like that colour when I bought them, but they just "wash out" with my skin tone and look like I'm bare-legged.

[OC Richard]

It's a problem for re-enactors.

The standard "Day" hose with diamond pattern turnover cuffs won't do.

The What Price Glory hose are sort of OK, but thin and (in my opinion) not quite the right colour.

And that's an interesting and complex question: just what is the proper colour for military No2 Dress Non-Ceremonial hose? It depends on what time period, which regiment, and which rank.

The modern RRS ones are widely available. No problems there. They're Lovat.



These shooting socks on Ebay are very close to the RRS Lovat hose

https://www.ebay.com/itm/GREEN-EXTRA...9Uo7iu2mfzLtJQ

Since my outfit is WWII it's another thing.

Officers (and certain senior NCOs) of The Black Watch wore hose in the colour often called "natural", I suppose it could be called beige. In general the Officers' hose of the various Highland regiments looked to me more or less like civilian shooting socks/kilt hose, in natural or Lovat depending on the regiment.



Here's an Officer of the Argylls wearing these natural/beige Officer's hose. They are not tan and have no tinge of green. "Stone" might be a good description.



These look very much like the Black Watch WWII Officers' hose; notice they don't have the yellow tinge that typifies various colours called "khaki" and "tan" in the US, but have a cool tinge, very slightly bluish tinge.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-WW2-Bri...WxAb:rk:2:pf:0

The Other Ranks hose varied from a colour more or less like US "khaki" to a colour more or less like British "khaki". (British "khaki" is close to US "olive drab" while US "khaki" is close to British "stone" cf the British military "stone" shirts.) There doesn't seem to have been a notion of matching the hose to the colour of the tunics, for example. The tunics would be British khaki but the hose more of a Lovat sometimes, more of a stone sometimes.

This painting shows a variety of colours worn by Officers of the 51st Division in North Africa in WWII (beige for Black Watch, Lovat for Seaforths, etc)



Bottom line is that "shooting socks" are widely available with the military-style look in a wide variety of colours. I got mine off Ebay. Here are some that have the right look.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Alpaca-COUN...cguhelBGGO1s-g

If it's British khaki you want here's hose that are very close. They call the colour "derby"

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Pennine-Gam...sC_6bLJf7PW-Zg

Which goes to show you can't go by what they call the colours… different makers are all over the map.

[Tobus]

And on that note, I may actually take the pair of oatmeal/stone hose that I mentioned in a previous post and try to dye them a little darker. Maybe even just tea-stain them or something. I thought I would like that colour when I bought them, but they just "wash out" with my skin tone and look like I'm bare-legged.

With some free time on my hands this week (I took a staycation, as they call it), I went ahead and coffee-stained those oatmeal/stone hose.

One large pot of coffee, cooled to lukewarm. One pair of hose. Stir.



After soaking for 24 hours, I took them out and squeezed the excess coffee out, but did not rinse them. I just laid them out to air-dry, which took a couple of days. Then rinsed them in cold water, hoping to retain as much staining as I could.

As I suspected, these hose have a high content of synthetic fibers and didn't darken a whole lot. The difference from before and after was pretty slight. But they did pick up a yellowish-brownish tint. I'm not sure I like them any better than before, but I guess I'll just have to see how they look with my kilts.

Before and after, trying to photograph them in the same light:

[Tarheel]

Toby, if the color bleeds out of the hose you just "coffee brewed." add a cup of apple cider vinegar to the mix next dying job. That will set the color better in the hose. Rinse with fresh cold water to get the odor out (unless you prefer the smell of pickles).

[tweedhead]

It looks like you already found a source, but fyi I purchased a few pairs of shooting socks last month, these ones specifically
dinmore_cushion_shooting_sock_greenacre_garter_3.jpg
These are the Dinmore sock from, literally, shootingsocks.co.uk. What they call 'greenacre' is a nice olive green in person and the length gives me enough material to double up the cuff at the top as they're meant to go overtop rubber boots. I had originally planned only to use them for work (inside rubber chainsaw boots) but they are quite handsome and I think they'll make excellent minimalist kilt hose. It's a simple robust rib knit, no extraneous design. I actually got two pairs in olive, two in grey and one in wine red and they threw in a free pair of one of their other styles. Definitely not suited to warm weather, I'm still wearing my steel-toed leather logging boots in -10 C temperatures and they're holding the cold off.

e; looking at their site again it seems greenacre is the only colour they have in stock in size small, how serendipitous

[Tobus]

Thanks, that may be something I go with on future purchases. I'd love to see photos of you wearing them with your kilt.

[kingandrew]

I can endorse the quality of shootingsocks.co.uk hose. My school had a Thanksgiving dinner event last night and I wore a pair of their socks (maroon with turnover in bright red edged in bright green). They look great with the kilt and have held up well over many years of use.

As noted, they are thick, warm wool socks. Great in winter but not so great in a Texas summer.

Andrew

[Tobus]

Apologies for a long overdue update on this...

I received my two pair of plain hose from Sally Pointer just after Christmas (thanks again for the tip, Glen!); one in moss green and one in mid brown. These are just what I was looking for in terms of the style. Plain hose with no ribbing or adornments, and a nice thick knitted wool material. Much thicker than the HoC hose that are so popular, but not as thick as my handmade cable-knit hose of course. They are just right.

This is the mid brown pair I'm wearing below. It's not quite khaki, as it lacks any green hue to it. And the moss green pair is a very bright olive colour; too bright to be considered khaki either. But I like both colours. The mid brown just happens to pair perfectly with my kilt.

About the only thing that isn't perfect on these hose is that they're too long up the leg for me, especially since I prefer to wear my hose more in the Victorian style length, well below the knee and just past the widest portion of my calf. I dislike the modern trend of wearing kilt hose all the way up to the knee. So with these, I had to do an under-fold just below the cuff. That along with my woollen garter ties, adds a bit of lumpiness under the cuff, which is accentuated by shadows in these photos.

I will likely be ordering more hose from her, and will request them about an inch shorter next time. I believe she can do other colours besides the ones listed on her site, and I'll likely explore that option for something more true to a khaki hue.

[McMurdo]

They look great, I had to ask for a shorter length on my second pair as well.