Sock Monster

I've got to admit it... I've let my socks get out of control. They've nearly taken over. Like a garden that has become overgrown, I think I may have reached the point where I need to get rid of the whole lot and start again. The trouble is that, once socks become separated, they may enter the wash independent of each other and bleach/streatch/wear at different rates, making a succesful reunion of previously paired socks nigh on impossible.

The Sock Monster would be a huge perspex machine with a hopper at one end and a small kiosk selling pairs of second-hand socks at the other. In the middle would be a washing machine, tumble dryer and lots of robot arms and measuring devices... and a furnace. A sock monster definitely needs a furnace.

You would arrive at the gallery with your odd socks (bringing a lonely sock might be the admission price of the exhibit) and put it into the hopper. The sock is picked up by a robot arm and analysed by colour, texture and smell. Smelly socks are put straight into the furnace. The remainder are matched to similar coloured socks of similar materials and are washed together.

Once washed and dried, the socks are categorised by as many attributes as the machine can measure: length, thickness, overall colour, colour variation, pattern, texure, dry weight, wet weight, and so on. Socks with too many holes join their many friends in the furnace which is used to provide 0.01% of the power that the Sock Monser requires. Socks that match to within a certain tolerance are termed a pair, stitched with the gallery's logo, barcoded and dispensed into the kiosk where they can be sold to the gallery visitors.