I have quite a collection of kilt hose, both store bought and hand knit, and all of them are wool blends to some degree or other. I machine wash them.

If you have a pair of 100% wool hose, or if you are an irregular kilt wearer and only wear your hose every so often, it would definitely be worth your while to hand wash them. You can wash them in the sink with a little woolite, following the instructions on the bottle. Heck, you can take them in the bath with you and wash them with some shampoo if you like (wool is hair, after all!). Conditioner would make them nice and soft!

But if you are like me and wear the kilt often, and end up with a whole basket full of kilt hose, to wash, you might find machine washing to be more reasonable. As I said, all of mine are wool blend to some degree. I just wash them (by which I mean, my wife washed them), on the gentle/delicate cycle, in cold water. Then we let them air dry. DO NOT PUT THEM IN THE DRYER (unless you are trying to get hose to fit your kilted cabbage patch doll).

In my years of washing hose this way, once or twice I have had an irregular pair of hose shrink using this method, even if they were a wool blend like my others. So it's not fool-proof. But I find it to work very well with most hose available on the market, as well as what my wife has knit for me.

(what my bedroom looks like on laundry day)