My dear friends, here's a free pattern and tutorial for making naalbound men's socks.
The size of this pair is for European shoesize 45 (UK size 10,5). Since Einarr can't stand socks made of real wool, I made these with acrylic. I bought yarn for knitting needle nr. 4 (UK needle 8) and took a double thread for naalbinding.
The socks are made in Oslo-stitch, see these YouTube instructions for that stitch:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8PXk5lTIZo
The socks are made from the toe up, this means you start at the toe. You start the "toe cap" with a loop of 10 stitches. Increase gradually until you have 46 stitches.
After 15 cm increase to 54 stitches to make room for the instep. After 20 cm in total you need to make the 'cross-over' to the ankle part of the sock. Take 27 stitches and work them seperately from the rest of the sock. Attach them again at stitch nr. 28 of the toe-part of your sock. Continue to work the stitches and decrease 4 stitches in the next two rounds.
After 5 cm decrease 6 stitches over the next 4 rounds. Finish the ankle part of the sock.
For the heel, pick up the stitches at the bottom of the foot part and the bottom of the ankle part. You'll have about 54 stitches in total. In the next round, increase 2 stitches in the corners to give the heel room. The second round naalbind the stitches as they come, for the next rounds decrease 4 or 5 stitches each row until you have about 10 stitches left. Close them up with a simple stitch and your sock is done!
An excellent book for socks is "Lots of Socks" by Larry Schmitt, available at Spanish Peacock. The pattern I've given you here is derived from his 'Simple Sock'.
