HOW TO... TURN A SOCK HEEL

Take the trauma out of turning a heel with our step-by-step explanation

This sock has been unravelled, leaving the instep artificially long, to show how the ankle shaping links to the instep. The row in blue marks where the shaping begins, right over the ankle bone. The shaping extends to allow for the shape of the ankle, then decreases to return to the right size for the foot.

When actually knitting the ankle and instep of the sock, the two sections are worked simultaneously in the round. You will use SSK and K2tog so that the stitches lie in the right directions for both sides of the foot.

Next, we knit the foot. The brown section on the right shows the sole of the foot. The top (white) section is the instep. The instep has not changed shape throughout the knitting and continues in white. With the same number of stitches as for the leg, we can continue knitting the foot on these stitches until we reach the toe shaping.