so not too long ago I did a review of some sale cloth straps from artum that cost over $200 which admittedly is a pretty crazy price for watch straps and a lot of you guys commented telling me that there are other strap companies out there that are producing straps that are just as good or close to as good at artum at a much lower price and I'm always looking for a good deal and due to the fact that it seems like there's an explosion of interest in sale cloth straps lately I fig there's a great
chance to take a look and see what else is out there so I rounded up watchstraps from 11 different brands I actually got them in hand to be able to test them to wear them to try them out to see what the difference in quality is between these lower cost straps and artum straps and that's what this video is going to be we'll go in depth talk about what exactly a sale cloth strap is see why they're so appealing and then we'll jump through and do a bunch of mini reviews of each of these strap
Brands my name is Dave welcome back to my channel just the watch and I'm here to talk all about affordable watch collecting as always I'm filming this from my home in IAT Japan and today we're going to be talking about sale cloth watch straps now sale cloth watch straps are one of my favorite kinds of watch straps I feel like they offer a great level of Versatility because they are both rugged and yet have an elegant style to them at the same time the whole idea of sail cloth is kind of this romantic image that's
associated with yachting and sailing and things that are kind of tied to the Finer Things in life and that's why they're often found on luxury watches watches that cost 5,000 10,000 $20,000 but they can do a lot to elevate an affordable watch as well which is why I have a couple of watches in my collection that are pretty much permanently attached to a sale cloth strap and before we jump in and start talking about individual Brands we got to start by talking about what exactly a sale cloth strap is because that's sort of confusing these
days you would think it's something simple that a sale cloth strap is something that's made out of sale cloth and then you might ask well what exactly is sailcloth and obviously this is the material that sales on ships are made out of but at what era are we talking about because ships have been around for a long time and at different points in history ship sales have been made out of a lot lot of different materials modern sales are made out of nylon and Kevlar very strong durable weather resistant materials but older ships had sales
that were made out of cotton or linen or canvas so can any of these materials be classified as sale cloth well since saale cloth is really just a marketing term yes to complicate matters even more artum and most of the brands that we're going to be looking at today don't even actually use sail cloth anymore and that's not necessarily a bad thing because sailcloth isn't exactly an ideal material to make a watch strap out of it certainly has a beautiful look to it but often times it results in a strap that's somewhat stiff it relies
on backing materials that may not be very water resistant and in the past I've seen a lot of sailcloth straps that just aren't that comfortable to wear and so what many Brands even some of the more premium ones like artum have done is they've switched over to using a synthetic material that has a number of layers to it the top layer usually being some kind of rubber or plastic that is embossed with a sailcloth pattern now most of the brands aren't saying exactly what this material is made out of other than that it is a
synthetic material but it looks very nice is highly water resistant and tends to be more Supple than actual cloth and so when we look at these straps today there are two main categories of straps that we're going to be looking at those that are made out of this embossed material where it's got a sail cloth pattern on it but it isn't actually cloth and those that are made out of actual fabric with individual threads and fibers to them in general when you're comparing these two types of sail cloth straps the embossed ones with the synthetic
uppers tend to be more comfortable and pliable and they tend to do a lot better when it comes to water resistance meanwhile the ones that are made out of actual fabric can have a more appealing more genuine look to them but often tend to be a little bit stiffer and take longer to break in another big difference between these two types of straps is how they're going to show signs of age when it comes to the embossed ones that have that synthetic material one of the things that you're going to see as they start to
get older is they will tend to crack and even peel whereas on the other hands the ones that are made out of fabric are going to have a tendency to fray and maybe thread might start to unravel and become loose so they're going to age in very different ways and we've got a very wide range of prices to look at I think the most expensive strap that we'll be looking at today is around $215 and the cheapest one is $6 and since we've got so many straps to go through I'm going to give you time
stamps down below so you can jump around if there's a particular one you're interested in I would recommend at least watching the section on artum because we're going to be kind of comparing a lot of these straps to artum straps and then from there jumping over to other more affordable ones that you might be interested in checking out let me give you a rundown of the straps that we're going to be looking at so the first category of straps we'll look at are the artum style straps so these are the artum straps themselves and then
other brands that are marketing straps that are very similar in look and style to what artum is offering and in that category we obviously have artum as the original and then coming out of the UK there's a new brand called Northstar which is kind of trying to present themselves as a UK alternative to artum they're coming in at a price below artum but above most of the other ones on on this list then after that we'll look at North straps not to be confused with Northstar this is a strap company that sells a variety of
different ones they've recently started offering sale cloth straps again very similar in style to artum straps and then next I want to check out a couple of very inexpensive AliExpress straps to see how they compared to the more expensive ones and then the last of our artum style straps will be one from CNS straps who make very affordable watch straps other than AliExpress these are the cheapest ones I could find and then I want to talk briefly about straps Co I don't have any of their straps in for review but a lot of people asked
me to look at them I'll explain why I didn't get them in and what my opinion is on their straps in that section after that we want to jump over and look at Zulu diver who are making sale cloth straps that are not modeled after artum straps they have their own unique style and these are my favorite ones outside of artum so if you're not aware of those I would definitely recommend you check that out finally we'll move over to the fabric straps and the first one of those we'll look at is from watch Bandit
this is I think my favorite of the fabric straps it's got a very nice look to it decent price and is very well made next we'll switch over to Bart and Richie who both offer very similar sale cloth style straps and then finally we'll close it out by looking at one more AliExpress strap again a very inexpensive fabric based strap finally most of these straps were sent to me for free I went and asked different brands I was interested in featuring if they would send me a sample in so that I could put them in
this video some of them I wasn't able to get for free so I went out and purchased myself I'll list down in the description if you want to check out exactly which ones I got for free and which ones uh I paid for with all that said let's jump through the reviews we're going to start by looking at artum straps because in so many ways they really are the gold standard for aftermarket sale cloth straps right now they launched about 3 years ago and have a reputation for being obsessive about quality which has resulted in
them continually upgrading and improving their products and won them a pretty loyal fan base I'll be focusing on two of artom straps their classic sale cloth and their loopless sail cloth strap both of these are modeled after very expensive OEM straps from luxury watch makers the classic takes inspiration from Blanc Pond's OEM sale CLW strap that they use on their 50 Fathoms divers while the loopless takes its inspiration from omega's deployant style fabric straps used on their speed master line and artem is clearly targeting the luxury watch Market with their products these are straps that
are designed to fit and look good on luxury watches and that's important to note because it really factors into their pricing their straps are much more affordable than the OEM straps often undercutting them by half or more however when compared to other aftermarket straps they're still fairly expensive they sell their classic straps for $85 a piece and the loopless is going to set you back a whopping $215 including the clasp now because artom straps have become so popular and because their price is fairly High compared to other aftermarket straps there has been a lot of
competitors rising up recently that are selling what appears to be much more affordable versions or takes on the artum style strap and so I rounded up straps from four other brands that are extremely similar in appearance to the artem strap but cost significantly less so after looking at these utum straps we'll switch over and see how these new competitors fare and hopefully give you an idea whether or not it's worth it for you to pay the premium to get an artum strap or if you can save some money getting one of these cheaper ones so
starting with artum they are the most expensive straps on this list but I'll say this right off the bat they are also the highest quality by a significant margin for starters the construction of each strap is pretty much Flawless there are no rough edges no splitting on any of the seams nothing is peeling apart or separating every Stitch is in place and it's pretty obvious that they have a higher level of quality control compared to these other brands that are selling straps for much less expensive and that would make sense if you're selling a strap
for $20 versus selling it for $85 obviously at $20 you're not going to have that much of a margin to really check every individual strap before it gets sent out one particularly important area on the strap is where the spring bar is attached to the strap this is usually the part of the strap that's going to fail first and it's also one of the most dangerous fail points for a strap because if the strap rips there then the watch will fall off your wrist and can get damaged and when you look at em straps you
can see that that part is extremely well constructed there's no gaps or fraying around the spring bars everything is very clean very tight and very secure and that's not necessarily the case on some of these other straps that we're going to be looking at likewise the construction and finishing of the buckles and clasps that are cells is significantly higher than the others on this list they're very solid and have a premium level of brushing and polishing on them another thing to keep in mind with artum is that they are really dedicated to improving their products
all of their straps have gone through multiple iterations all of their clasps all of their buckles all of their materials they are listening intently to their customers into complaints about their products and always trying to fix them and improve them with new versions and they've been doing this for about 3 years now which means that they have a three-year head start on these competing brands that are cropping up these newer less expensive brands are often on their first generation of straps and while they obviously have a big Advantage being able to kind of copy what
artum has already done and found what works they haven't been tested in the same way that artem straps have one particular area of concern that I have regarding these synthetic sailcloth straps is that synthetic material this material is prone to cracking and peeling over time so getting the formulation of that material right is very important you need to find the right blend of suppleness and durability and artum has been working on multiple versions of that formulation to get it to a place that they're happy with and they seem to be fairly confident in their formulation
because they're the only brand that offers a 2-year warranty that does cover that cracking and delamination so if you do get an artum strap you know that it's going to at least last you two years another advantage to this revision is that their products have gotten better over the years some of the common complaints about artum straps in the past has been that they're stiff and difficult to break in and I initially received some of their first gen straps when they first launched and I found that to be true as well however for this video
I asked them to send in some of their newest classic sail cloth straps and I found them to be much more Supple and easy to break in than previous ones with a little bit of flexing and massaging I found that they pretty quickly conformed to my wrist and felt very comfortable artum straps also have a very good design they just have a more premium look and feel to them than a lot of the competitors this is most noticeable in the stitching and particularly in that padded section near the spring bars the classic strap features a
somewhat dramatic bulge there that just has a kind of Premium look to it while the loopless version has a more subtle smoother curve to it the final thing to keep in mind with artum straps is that they have an exclusive deal with their manufacturing Partners so some people might be wondering if these other brands that look like artum are actually getting the identical straps from the same Factory and then marking them down artum is confident that that is not happening and from my own comparison as well I found a lot of significant differences between the
products that artum puts out and the ones that are coming from their competitor s and that said the straps that are coming out from these other four brands that I'm looking at do look a lot more similar to each other than they do to artum straps so I think particularly when you look to some of these brands that sell a lot of different styles of straps that don't specialize in a single type of strap like artom does it seems fairly likely that when they want to put out a sale cloth strap they're probably going to
the same manufacturer or at least manufacturers that are putting out very similar products and maybe sharing patterns between them and we'll definitely see some similarities as we get into these other brands the main disadvantage of utum straps is obviously the cost and for people who focus more on the affordable segment of the market that cost is a significant downside a fully kitted out loopless strap from artum is going to be more expensive than a brand new watch for a lot of people and that's what's going to make a lot of these artum style Alternatives a
lot more attractive now all that said there's a couple of practical things that you also need to take into consideration when looking at these different brands one important one is the size of the straps artum does offer a lot of different lug sizes so they should have you covered there but they also offer multiple lengths as well and this is where it might get a little bit tricky for me in particular I'm kind of in between sizes on their classic sail cloth straps I have a 7 and 1/2 in wrist and on the standard size
I think I'm on like the second to last hole but then if I go up to the XL size I'm on the tightest hole so those multiple sizes are going to help a lot of people who have either small or large wrists but it might be a bit of a challenge if if you're in between like me another consideration is the location that each brand ships from artum is based out of Australia so if you don't live in Australia you may have to pay import taxes or shipping might take a little bit longer if that's
a concern for you some of the other brands that we're going to be looking at ship from either the United Kingdom or the United States so that's also worth noting all right next up we're going to take a look at a strap from Northstar straps not to be confused with North straps which also sent a strap in for review so we'll be looking at them as well North Star seems to be trying to position themselves as a UK based alternative to artum straps like artum they offer both a classic strap and what they call their
deploy strap which is very similar to artem's loopless strap they sent me one of their deploy straps so that's what I'm going to be focusing on here and it is very similar to artem's loopless strap it features an embossed synthetic upper a padded midsection and then a leather lining that has been coated in a natural cchuck rubber compared to artum straps the synthetic upper material is noticeably thicker than what artom offers and they mentioned that their expectation is that that should increase the lifespan of the strap it makes the strap a little bit more stiff
but I didn't really notice that big of a difference it was still extremely comfortable on the wrist another point of Distinction is that rather than offering multiple sizes they offer one kind of in between size so their straps are longer than artem's standard size but shorter than their XL size so this single strap should fit a wider range of wrists than either one of artem's two options individually and for me with a 7 and 1/2 in wrist this was a really good size so depending on your wrist size that may be a point in favor
of Northstar straps price-wise this is the second most expensive strap on the list fully kitted out with the strap and the clasp this one's going to run $143 which is significantly less than artem's $216 loopless option with the clasp and while this is undoubtedly a much more appealing price point there were a few areas where I noticed a lower level of quality compared to artum straps for one the edges on the synthetic embossed material that they're using did seem to be slightly peeling away up near the spring bars and that's kind of concerning to me
because again that's one of the biggest questions I would have with this synthetic material is how it's going to last in the long run also due to the thickness of this material when it is folded over at certain points on the strap it is a lot more noticeable and a little bit less clean looking finding the clasp itself well very similar to EMS in terms of functionality did have a few sharp edges on it it's noticeable on the corner of the pushers of the clasp that you use to disengage it but the bigger problem I
had was when I was trying to fit the strap to the clasp it did get caught in the pin and as I was trying to get it Loose it did tear that rubber coating a little bit so when you go with the setup definitely be careful when you are sizing the strap up with the clasp the last thing to mention is a visual difference between this and the artum strap like artum it features a heavily padded section near the spring bars that tapers down to a flat section near near the clasp on the North deploy
that padded section is a little bit boxier and more wedge like compared to artem's more rounded offering and the transition between the padded and flat section isn't quite as smooth as it is on the artum straps it's a fairly minor difference but it is something that jumped out at me when I was evaluating the straps now on the wrist this feels pretty much identical to artum straps I also wouldn't be able to tell any difference in the surface of the material the synthetic upper again looks and feels pretty much identical to what artm is offering
again from the side you can see that the material on the Northstar is a little bit thicker than artms but this still looks and feels like a very high quality strap the only hesitation I would have with it is that it doesn't come with the 2-year warranty like artum does still it's coming in at a significantly lower price point undercutting utumn by about $70 and they also ship from the UK base so particularly if you're in the UK it may be a good option for you all right next up we have a strap from North
straps again not to be confused with North Star straps it is is kind of confusing both North and Northstar are based out of the UK to my knowledge North straps has been around longer I could be wrong about that but I have done a review of North straps before in the past North offers many different straps on their site I've been particularly fond of their NATO style nylon straps but they recently started offering sailcloth straps as well so I asked them if they'd be willing to send one over to include in this video and this
is another one that's clearly inspired by artom straps like Northstar it features the same kind of construction and material with an embossed synthetic upper a padded midsection and then a lining that is made out of leather that's been coated in a natural cchuck Rubber and incidentally both North and Northstar call that synthetic material Oxford sailcloth fabric now if you dig down into northstar's FAQ section they are clear that that is an embossed synthetic material and not an actual Fabric or textile but this Oxford sailcloth fabric is something that I saw listed on a lot of
sailcloth strap sites and is near as I can tell it is a synthetic material it's not a fabric at all so it's kind of a misleading marketing term but once again the synthetic material feels extremely similar to the material on artum straps I don't know what the formulation of this synthetic material is it's probably not exactly the same as EMS but I wouldn't be able to tell the difference what I do really like about these straps from North is that they feel very high quality and yet they're coming at a price point of only $48
which is definitely on the lower end for one of these artum style sailcloth straps North also put a lot of work into the buck on this strap and that is a distinct feature of this strap from North again the sailcloth strap itself feels like it's going to be very similar from Brand to brand but the buckles and the hardware is something that each brand tends to customize on their own and North has a very high quality very well-finished steel buckle on the strap that really elevates the look of it later on when we get down
to the AliExpress straps I found one that essentially uses the same pattern as this strap the construction and the materials is definitely a lower quality than what North offers but the shape and the placement of the holes and everything is identical I mean it lines up perfectly which again is one of the reasons I'm led to believe that many of the sailcloth straps that you're seeing out there are coming from the same factories or that the factories are sharing the patterns or the designs with each other I'm getting on a bit of a tangent here
but that's also one of the reasons why I didn't go out and get a strap from strapsco and darari but the hardware does seem to be different from strap to strap so that's something to keep in mind so I like the north strap because of the price point and cuz it does have a good buckle on it that said once again I do see some noticeable dips in quality compared to what ardom offers there are some rough edges with what looks to be the start of some peeling on that material the holes for the spring
bars aren't quite as clean but they do look like they're reinforced with an extra little tube in there so that's nice to see as far as size goes north is currently only offering these in 20 mm so if you're looking for a different lug width you won't be able to get it from North right now and they are using the kind of longer size that again fits my 7 1/2 in wrist pretty good but it may be a bit long if you have a small wrist and again in terms of comfort on the wrist they're
a little bit stiffer than artem's latest generation but not much with a little bit of Breakin time they become very comfortable pretty quickly as far as style goes again they're very similar to artem's Classic sailcloth straps but they aren't identical in terms of look that padded contoured section isn't as dramatic on these North straps it doesn't look and feel as premium the EM straps really do have this pronounced bulge in the center of the straps near the spring bars that somehow signals that it's a luxurious strap it is more complicated to manufacture and to get
right these straps from North look good but they don't have nearly the same level of contouring that artum offers but all in all $48 for this level of quality is kind of a sweet spot for me as an affordable watch collector this is getting more into the realm of what I would probably purchase for myself unless I really had a special watch that I wanted to get the highest quality strap and then I'd probably splurge and get the $85 artum classic all right let's move on to a couple of AliExpress straps that I picked up
for very cheap that also appear to be made out of a synthetic embossed sailcloth material on the surface at least looking very similar in construction to what artom offers or to what Northstar offers or to what North offers but I say on the surface because like most AliExpress places they don't really tell you what the strap is actually made out of so we're kind of left guess on that but I want to start with this $10 strap that I picked up because this one looks the most like the artum and the north strap this is
the one that I mentioned in particular that when you line it up with the north strap it fits the pattern exactly it's the same size the holes are placed in the same position everything matches up perfectly but notably it doesn't line up perfectly with the EM strap but while this does appear to be using the same pattern as the strap from North the material and the quality is definitely a step down it has a kind of cardboard like stiffness to it and it is a little bit thinner than the North strap and especially when you
look at the Spring Bar Bar holes that doesn't inspire a lot of confidence there it's not finished very nicely it's loose and it's not reinforced in any way also I'm not really a fan of the all polished Buckle that they've included here it looks like they were trying to copy the Gen one version of artom saale cloth classic straps but artom has long since abandoned that Buckle style for one that is much more sleek and appealing in my opinion so I'm really not a fan of the buckle on this $10 alley Express strap I also
have no idea what the underside of this is made out of it feels very similar to the underside of the other straps but I kind of doubt that it's made out of natural rubber but they don't say and I don't have any way to test it but the synthetic upper again I would have a really hard time telling the difference just by look and feel of this versus the ones from artum or any of the other ones on this list and overall I was pretty shocked at how good this strap is for $10 now I
would be very hesitant to use this strap on a watch that I like because I would be concerned about the construction and possibly failing or falling off the wrist but I'm not sure that that fear would even be warranted this feels like a really good strap for $10 so if you're looking to kind of test out a sailcloth strap to see if you like the way that it looks or feels you kind of can't go wrong with this and I actually found another sailcloth strap that's also very similar I think it was around $6.50 and
this one even threw in quick release spring bars which was a nice upgrade overall this is a much flatter strap it also feels a lot thicker and a little bit stiffer so it's not coping the artum look quite as much as these other ones the buckle on this one feels pretty well made although the finishing isn't great it's just kind of a roughly brushed finish all the way around again for $6.50 this feels like an amazing strap I'd just be kind of afraid to actually use it I feel like in order to make the strap
this cheap some Corners have to be cut somewhere and I just don't know if I trust it or not but it feels and looks shockingly good now I know 100 100% for a fact I'm going to get a lot of people that are going to accuse me of being biased towards artum straps so to help mitigate that a little bit I decideed to call in a second opinion I asked my wife who knows nothing about watch straps to take a look at three straps I gave her the artum classic sail cloth the north sailcloth strap
and the AliExpress sail cloth strap all three of which feature a very similar style and I asked her to take some time to examine the feel of them to look at them closely for imperfections and to try and determine which one was the most expensive second most expensive and least expensive almost immediately like within 20 seconds she picked the AliExpress trap as being the least expensive strap it took her much longer to decide between the North strap and the artum strap but after a minute or so of looking them over very closely she determined that
the artum strap was probably the more expensive of the two because she felt that the artum strap had just a cleaner level of construction so I thought that was kind of interesting that even someone who didn't have any experience with sale cloth watch straps was still able to pick out which one was the expensive one which one was the mid-price one and which one was the cheap one all right last of the artom style straps I want to look at CNS sale cloth straps because they are the cheapest one that I was able to find
that's not on AliExpress I've always liked CNS straps they have a ton of variety and they are typically the cheapest straps that you can buy so I particularly like them for trying out new styles of straps on watches I often find that I'm not that happy with the quality of the straps that they offer but but as far as like getting a good variety in and getting to kind of see what something looks like on a watch I think they're great for that I didn't notice that they had sailcloth straps until after I'd gotten a
lot of the other ones in for reviews so to speed things up I just purchased a couple directly especially because they were available for only $20 on their site and getting them in they are extremely similar to the other artum style s cloth straps that we've gotten the material feels the same the construction feels the same the description seems a little bit off on their site similar to a lot of other brands they're claiming that the top is made from genuine sailcloth fabric when in reality this feels like the same synthetic material that everybody else
is using it's definitely some kind of rubber or plastic that has been embossed with a sailcloth pattern on it they're also saying that the underside is made from calf leather which may be the case however it also appears to be Co in rubber just like all of the other straps that we've seen so far in terms of the feel of the strap it seems like it's a little bit closer to the AliExpress strap there does appear to be just a single layer of that synthetic sailcloth material keeping the Spring Bar in place and one OB
obvious difference is with the Buckle that is used here I think CNS wanted to use their standard Buckle that they use on a lot of their other straps which has a very thin Tang to it and so that also means that they've punched smaller holes into the strap as well the Buckle is okay but because of that thinner Tang it does feel less secure and sturdy than the other buckles that we've seen but I do like the look of this Buckle way better than the one that came on the AliExpress strap I also really like
their color selection on their straps especially this black one with this kind of off-white stitching I think that really really goes well with vintage style watches and just as far as color palette goes this was my favorite one to pair up with my squal Corso Italiano I think the stitching just perfectly matches that kind of vintage patined look that they were going for on this watch and overall I think these are fairly high quality straps for the price and especially a great option if you're just looking to try out one of these sale cloth straps
to see if it's something that you're going to like or not all right I want to take a minute to talk about straps code toari straps because that was one of the most requested ones when I put out a questionnaire asking which straps I should look at in this video and unfortunately I wasn't able to actually get these ones in to check out I did reach out to strapsco and asked if they'd be willing to send some over I never got a reply back from them I thought about purchasing them myself so that I could
have them in for this review however after finding such similarities between the three or four other artum style straps that I got in and doing a little bit of online research and looking closely at their product shots I'm fairly confident that these are almost exactly like the other ones that we've already looked at so so it just really didn't seem worth it but I do want to point out a few things about their deployant class because that one's coming in at a pretty reasonable price of $60 which is way cheaper than any of the other
deployant options out there and curiously it's only about $10 more than their standard sale cloth strap and so this is just pure speculation on my part but I'll go ahead and give you my opinion I suspect they're using a lower quality clasp than either artom or Northstar here if they're only increasing the price by $10 between their classic and their deployant strap that to me tells me that that deployant clasp must not have cost them that much money because that deployant clasp itself is a big part of the cost when it comes to these style
straps for instance if you go and look on AliExpress even you're going to find these exact same clasps being sold for anywhere from $4 all the way up to $30 so I'm guessing that that's why darari is able to keep the cost so low on their deployant style straps there is one other objective difference and that that is on the darari deployant style straps they don't have that little protective strip of silicone over the holes that's going to save on cost a little bit as well there's less materials involved and less construction so yeah that's
what I think is going on with these darari deployant ones again this is largely just speculation because I wasn't able to get them into compareed directly but I did want to address it because so many people were asking specifically about straps Co straps next we're going to take a look at Zulu diver and these are by far my favorite nonarom sailcloth straps and there's a number of different reasons for that first these are a different and unique design from artum straps and I really like that it's kind of boring if everybody's just trying to copy
the artum straps and produce them at a cheaper price I like to see some variety here and I've got two straps from Zulu diver that both serve different purposes and they both have their own distinct Styles I also really like that Zulu diver is very clear upfront and accurate about the materials used more so than any other brand out there they'll tell you right off the bat that they're using synthetic materials they'll give you a breakdown of exactly the composition of how that synthetic material made and what the various layers of the strap are constituted
of so I love the level of transparency that they're giving you there and finally I like the materials that they are using they're the only ones that seem to be offering straps that are made completely of synthetic materials without having any leather in them which means that they're going to be a higher level of water resistance than any of the other straps on this list so they sent over two different strap designs one is called the MayDay rata and the other is called the Maverick and the Maverick is actually made completely out of their synthetic
sailcloth material so both top and bottom and as a result they list this strap as being waterproof something that I don't think any of the other straps on this list can claim so if you're looking for a sail cloth style strap that you can actually go swimming in this is probably one of your only options the other strap that they sent over the MayDay rata diver that one has a Laura lining which is a synthetic leather alternative and this strap they list that one as being water resistant not waterproof and so I suspect that Lura
material being a leather alternative isn't quite meant to be used used soaked in water all the time but it should still f a lot better than a strap that actually has leather in the composition of it and so again I think if you're looking for a strap that you want to take in water Zulu diver is probably going to be your best option and they have a couple of different options to choose from the MayDay rata diver is there more expensive of the two coming in at $78 it has a taper design that is reminiscent
of leather dress straps and the padding and the synthetic material on top does feel soft and supple the padding is less extreme then you see on the artum style strap so this does break in pretty easily and that Lura lining does feel softer and more comfortable on the wrist it does feel more like leather than the rubber coated leather that a lot of the other ones are using here I also like the color palette that they use on these Mayday rata style straps there's a lot of desaturated colors I got this gray version with an
off-white stitching and I really like the way that one looks for me this is the perfect strap to pair with a sports watch it's kind of a go anything do anything strap that's great toir with a go anything do anything watch the Maverick on the other hand does feel like a much more rugged strap it has less of a taper it has a bigger bulkier buckle and the lining on the underside isn't as soft or Supple as you find on the other straps there's a little bit of padding to it but not much and so
as a result it does break in very quickly but overall this one doesn't give you that kind of luxurious feel that a lot of other sail cloth straps do it still looks nice but it definitely feels a lot more utilitarian and it is again this this is a fully waterproof strap and price-wise this one comes in at $64 Zulu diver is based out of the UK but they do ship internationally and so if you're looking for a synthetic sale cloth strap that you can use in the water I think they're a great option and even
if you are just looking for any sale cloth strap they're offering something that's a little bit different than a lot of the other ones out there so I think they're well worth checking out all right let's finally move over to sale cloth straps that are actually using fabric so this kind of strap that's not using a synthetic or embossed material that's actually using fabric that has real threads and textiles in it this is what all sale cloth straps used to be like again I think artum when they introduced their synthetic sale claw straps onto the
market and those got so popular it's kind of Shifting the market in that direction but a lot of people don't like that they don't like the embossed material they think that's kind of a fake sale cloth they want something that has real actual cloth on it and those straps are a little bit harder to find now and again they do have some drawbacks and personally I have a preference for the synthetic sailcloth straps over the fabric ones the main reason being water resistance one of the things that really attracts me to a sailcloth strap is
that it is a strap that is sporty but looks dressy but if it's something that I can't really get wet at all I might as well just wear a leather strap but that's a personal preference thing so to begin looking at the fabric straps the first one I want to check out is watch Bandit and that was my favorite out of the fabric style straps that I got in this is also one that I purchased myself it is their premium sailcloth watch strap and it costs $54 the top of the strap is covered in nylon
fabric it's padded and then lined with a very soft genuine leather so this feels very comfortable on the wrist but again it's not going to be waterproof at all another very nice touch about this strap is that they have a leather strip going over around the holes on the strap and this is huge because one of the main problems with fabric straps is that they often start to fray particularly around the holes so this is going to prevent that from happening and it also gives the strap just a little bit of extra character however in
addition to a lack of water resistance the strap also falls victim to some of the other challenges that sail cloth or fabric straps often have particularly in that they feel even more stiff than these padded synthetic straps it's not bad it is just going to take some time to break in I think a lot of people can be kind of impatient with that but when you think of any kind of highquality product if you think of a good pair of shoes it takes time to break those in as well and if you wear the strap
enough it's eventually going to feel pretty comfortable and also well that synthetic emboss material looks good on a lot of these other straps you really can't compete with actual fabric there is a clear difference here in that the real fabric just looks more like real fabric it catches the light in different ways you're going to have little tiny threads kind of sticking out in some fraying and fuzzing because it's Fabric and there's a certain kind of charm to that this strap has a simpler more classic construction compared to the artum Blan Pond style straps it
doesn't have as luxurious of a look but this is a very simple versatile style that'll look great on a wide variety of different kinds of watches and at $54 I think this is a great price for this strap all right next up for fabric sale cloth straps we're going to be looking at Barton SL Richie straps now I've had both Barton and Richie send me their sale cloth straps and as near as I can tell they're pretty much identical so I'm going to lump them together here into the same review Barton sells their straps for
$27 and I believe they're based out of Texas meanwhile Richie sells theirs for $21 and I think they're based out of China these straps feature a nylon copper and then a leather lining so similar to what we saw from watch Bandit however these straps are heavily padded and fairly thick so they do take even longer to break in you kind of got to really work at them to get them to soften up and notably they don't include any protection over the holes on the strap and I have experienced a significant amount of fraying around the
holes on some of the straps that I've tested style-wise these also have a more rugged and kind of less elegant look to them there is no taper to the straps and they have a squared off flat Edge on the tail you just kind of gives them a different personality what is nice about them is that they offer them in a lot of very vibrant colors and the nylon here does have a little bit of a shine and Shimmer to it so it is a very interesting and appealing style however because these are leather lined again
they're not the kind of thing you want to get in the water pretty much ever and that combined with the little bit stiffer nature of the straps made them ones that I wasn't particularly Keen to wear however the price point is very attractive all right last strap on the list is another fabric strap that I picked up on AliExpress they had this one listed as a sailcloth strap it does use actual Fabric and not an embossed synthetic material and I paid about $9 for this one the construction is very simple you have a nylon upper
with a leather backing with no padding in between so this is a completely flat strap this means that it does bend very easily but it still has kind of a stiff almost kind of cardboard like feel to it it's nice that they included quick release spring bars on this strap and the material on the top it has a nice Shimmer to it a little bit of a Sheen which gives it a more interesting look than a typical canvas strap the Tang on the Buckle feels like it's very thin and I suspect that's probably going to
give you problems sooner rather than later and all of these straps I kind of was very rough with them as I was testing as really bending them and twisting them a lot back and forth to kind of break them in but also to see how they would fare and with this strap in particular after going through that process it did start to show a lot of creases and waves in that fabric material on the top that was very visible so overall this feels like the least durable strap of all of the ones that I've looked
at but as is so often the case with products from AliExpress it's pretty good for the money to get a strap that's made out of both leather and nylon with this construction and a quick release spring bar for n bucks that's pretty good but I don't think this really offers you any of the appeal that a sale cloth strap does I think if you're looking for a kind of canvas military looking strap maybe you might go with this but to me the whole point of a sale CLA strap is either to kind of signal this
sort of luxury style or look or because you want something that's more versatile that's both water resistant and looks elegant at the same time and this strap doesn't really give me any of that so all that to say if you're looking for sale cloth straps on AliExpress definitely be careful because I think some are going to be better than others all right guys thanks for sticking through this video let me know down in the comments which of these straps is your favorite and especially if you have any experience with any of these straps or have
any other ones to recommend definitely leave a com comment down below so if you're interested you can check the comments and get other opinions other than just mine I really think that the comments on videos like this are just as important if not more important than my own commentary it's great to get a lot of additional feedback and a lot of other perspectives so yeah help me out down below and make this review even better if you're interested in getting a watch theme t-shirt like this one you can pick it up on my website at
just the watch.com that's going to wrap it up for today thanks for watching I'll see you guys later bye
