June 2026
Sock Squad 2026
June · Purple
Wild Violet
A Guide to Hue, History, and Handmade Socks
This Month’s Shade
June's color has a name that feels like stumbling across a beautiful meadow you weren't expecting to find: Wild Violet.
Think of violets growing at the edge of a forest path, or the particular purple of dusk in early summer when the sky hasn't decided between blue and pink in its sunset. It's not the bold, commanding purple of royalty, and it's not a soft lavender either. It's something a little wilder than both, this color that feels alive and a little untamed, the way June feels before the full heat of summer settles in.
That's the feeling we were after with Wild Violet. A purple that feels natural rather than formal, deeply saturated but still wearable!
In your subscription this month, you’ll find:
Full Skein: Wild Violet, a rich, natural purple with tonal depth that keeps it from reading flat
Mini Skein: A monochromatic coordinating 20g mini thoughtfully chosen to complement and highlight the full skein
About the Base
Base: Rocky Mountain Purls
Fiber Content: 80% Superwash Bluefaced Leicester Wool / 20% Nylon
Yardage:
400 yards / 100g · Mini: 80 yards / 20g
Why This Base
Purple is a color that loves texture, and Rocky Mountain Purls is a base that delivers it beautifully.
Bluefaced Leicester is known for its exceptionally long staple length, which gives the yarn a natural luster and a slightly silky drape that you don't often find in a sock base. That sheen is everything for a color like Wild Violet. It lets the purple catch the light and shift between warm and cool tones as you knit, giving the color a living quality that a more matte base simply can't offer.
The 20% nylon keeps it durable enough for everyday wear without dulling that gorgeous BFL glow. For a color this rich and nuanced, you want a base that shows it off. Rocky Mountain Purls does exactly that.
The Story Behind Purple
For most of human history, true purple was impossibly expensive to produce. Tyrian purple, the most prized shade of the ancient world, came from a small sea snail called Thais haemastoma or Murex brandaris, and it took thousands of them to dye even a small amount of fabric. The smell of the process was notoriously horrible, and the color was so costly that it became the exclusive domain of emperors and the very highest ranks of the church. To wear purple was to show extraordinary power and wealth.
Things changed in 1856 when an eighteen-year-old chemistry student named William Perkin accidentally created the first synthetic dye, a soft purple he called mauve, while attempting to synthesize quinine with coal tar, which was used to treat Malaria. Almost overnight, purple went from the most exclusive color to something anyone could wear.
Wild Violet sits somewhere in the spirit of that transformation.
Background Image: Claude Monet, Waterloo Bridge, effet de brouillard (1899–1903). From- Christie's Images LTD
A few things worth knowing about Purple:
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Purple was among the most expensive dyes in the ancient world because extracting just one ounce required 250,000 snails.
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Mauve was still costly to produce: 100 pounds of coal created only 10 ounces of coal tar, which in turn produced just a quarter-ounce of dye. Its popularity was short-lived, as overconsumption drove the color out of fashion.
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Heliotrope became fashionable in the 1880s, because of purple's continued association with luxury. It also took had a more personal significance, governments of this era regulated mourning dressing for women, requiring widows to wear black and grey during full mourning. When they reached half-mourning, two years after their partner's death, heliotrope was the color required to wear, it symbolized devotion and the return to normality.
- Around the 1870s, many artists began giving their paintings a noticeable violet and blue tint The phenomenon was dubbed Violettomania, with people believing the painters were mentally unwell or suffering from an unknown condition. The likely explanation is more practical, painting en plein air under bright sunlight for extended periods is thought to have altered their vision, shifting how they perceived color on the canvas.
Info and facts from by The Secret Lives of Color by Kassia St. Clair
This Month’s Creative Direction
How Purple Lives on the Needles
Our Inspiration For This Months Purple:
Our inspiration for June's color: a meadow at the edge of summer, where wild violets and thistle push up through the grass and the light turns everything a little golden and a little blue at once.
It shines in:
- Simple stockinette that lets the color's tonal shifts take the stage.
- Lace that opens up the fabric.
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Stranded colorwork where violet anchors a moody palette.
The coordinating mini adds monochromatic contrast for cuffs, heels, and toes, or colorwork that feels timeless.
Project Ideas for Your Sock Squad Yarn
Simple Socks
DRK Everyday Socks by Andrea Mowry
Lace Socks
Midsummer Dancer Socks by Sari Nordlund
Stranded Colorwork Socks
Blooming Lavender Socks by Stone Knits (Perfect for the High Contrast Mini Skein Pack!)
High Contrast Mini Skein Pack Pre-Order
Thank you for being part of Sock Squad and for bringing each month’s color to life through your stitches. We can’t wait to see what you create with Wild Violet.
Share your finished socks with #FDFSockSquad on Instagram or in Discord 🤍
I just LOVE the fascinating color information that comes with each month’s Sock Squad. What a wonderful way to learn about the stunning color that arrives !