Fully fashioned stockings (FFS), are stockings that are knitted flat and then the two sides are sewn together forming the seam. The seam is an integral part of the stocking and not sewn on afterwards as is the case with more modern stockings. Fully fashioned stockings are becoming increasingly rare—only a handful of manufacturers worldwide now make them regularly.
Fully fashioned stockings are sized to the height and shoe size (generally) of the wearer and as such have little or no stretch in them as they have no lycra contained within the yarn.
In addition to the distinctive seam they also come in a number of heel designs (covered below) and the top of the seam where it meets the welt at the top of the stocking is completed by the welt being turned over and a finishing loop applied. The loop is needed to allow the needle sewing the seam to be withdrawn.
Heel styles vary from the original French (pyramidal) or point heel which was made most famous by the Aristoc Point Heel design to the Cuban and Havana heels—darkened reinforced heel design finishing in a square top rather than pointed top—the Cuban heel being defined by being much thinner and finishing higher up the calf than the Havana heel.
More recently a number of manufacturers have also started manufacturing different heel styles—most specifically the Manhattan heel which is a cross between the two above and French brand Gerbe coming out with some more distinctive designs around the heel.
Most manufacturers now offer fully fashioned stockings in a number of different colours, but also contrast seam designs and also contrast seam and heel designs have become popular, definitely a flash back to the vintage years, generally in champagne/copper with a black seam and heel.
Famous quotes containing the words fully, fashioned and/or stockings:
“Every man supposes himself not to be fully understood; and if there is any truth in him, if he rests at last on the divine soul, I see not how it could be otherwise. The last chamber, the last closet, he must feel was never opened; there is always a residuum unknown, unanalyzable. That is, every man believes that he has greater possibility.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Nature is so perfect that the Trinity couldn’t have fashioned her any more perfect. She is an organ on which our Lord plays and the devil works the bellows.”
—Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe (1749–1832)
“Lord Hamlet, with his doublet all unbraced,
No hat upon his head, his stockings fouled,
Ungartered, and down-gyved to his ankle,
Pale as his shirt, his knees knocking each other,
And with a look so piteous in purport
As if he had been loosed out of hell
To speak of horrors.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)