Words from our Founder

Marianne Wakerlin, Founder of Solmate Socks

My mother was Christened Agnes Lois Greig. She inherited the lineup of austere family labels going back to Norwegian composer Edvard Greig, her great-great-uncle. When she was twelve, she went to Girl Scout camp and, along with a swimming badge, attained a new name. Sunny. Spot on for a girl who smiled broadly, laughed easily and sprouted curly red hair that caught sunlight.

In her fifty years as a wife and mother of six children, she was consumed with heavy obligations. There was no opportunity to be rebellious, but she was plenty playful.

The colors in the original Sunny Socks, the ones knit in 2000 in wool, divulge mom’s predisposition for pushing the edges. Four safe, bright colors lay the foundation of the knitted garment. Cheerful yellow, passionate purple, soaring turquoise and shocking orange. But fuchsia? What sort of person adds an outrageous rose-colored magenta to a line up already brimming with exuberance?

My mother, that’s who. “Don’t think four bright colors is the end of it,” she might have said. “Let’s add some zest. Shake it up even more. Have a little fun.”

The Sunny Sock was the original. It was the first to come off the line when I founded the company in 2000.

For Founder’s Day, I celebrate Sunny, my mother. An original.

 

-Marianne Wakerlin, Founder of Solmate Socks