Review: PONGO London’s Ice White Socks

(2018) The power of social media is remarkable. Months ago a cycling shoe company’s Instagram page displayed an attractive combination of monochromatic shoes and socks. I loved the combination so much I played a long game of tracking the initial company. This is how I managed to get my hands on PONGO London’s Monochrome Ice White socks.

As evident in posts from last year I enjoy simpler styles, in particular footwear in the creakybottombracket.com office lockers. Simple white Bont Vaypor Classic lace-ups snap into the pedals. There is not artwork adorning the white canvas of the classical design. Accompanying the basic Bont shoes are always basic sock designs. There is no need for fellow cyclists to get up close to see shoe or sock detail. 

Here is the orginal Velokicks post that grabbed our attention to the PONGO London socks.

An often-repeated sentiment is that socks are a limited canvas. There is only so much an artist can do with socks before the idea gets too intimate or risks remaining basic. I thought I had bookmarked all of the socks that fit my need for basic designs with a slight amount of flare. That is, until a Velokicks post showed the greatest shoe/ sock combination I had seen in quite some time.

The Giro lace ups returned the acceptable feature of laces on cycling shoes. They have a bright white selection that has just enough black paneling to make for outstanding style. One may be tempted to add a massive splash of color to offset the monochromatic shoes. Or one can develop the black and white further by adding socks with the same black-to-white ratio as the Giro kicks. PONGO London went ahead and made socks in the style that immediately think, “Why didn’t someone come up with that sooner?” 

Take a basic white sock . Then imagine a paint can overflowing with black paint. There you have the gist of the Ice White socks by the London based cycling apparel company. The socks themselves are made in Italy, which means they will feel remarkably comfortable. Should one find white to be too much brightness, PONGO London makes black socks with silver shade appearing to overflow the proverbial paint can. We fell in love with the white socks and stayed there. These are simple yet paradoxically complex.

What these socks also do is put extra pressure on the cyclist to keep the white shoes as bright as possible. Having brand new white socks atop dingy leather shoes is a no-go. Be prepared to the bottom portion of the pins stylish as well as the shoe selection. Perhaps the socks are symbolic. Maybe that isn’t paint spilling over but oil. Maybe it’s not spilling over so much as its pistons leaking viscous lubrication at 10,000 RPM. Either way you look at it, these are cool-looking socks. Sometimes it’s as simple as that.