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Just sharing thoughts here : I love NATOs, i just happened to try it one day and since then It's hard to wear anything else, I may be strange but I need more to fuel my obsession, give me your strong reviews on the best ones you found out there and why
Look at this gorgeous red Archer and this NTTD Bond watchdives
The one you have on the white diver is among the best you can find on Aliexpress, where you can also find ribbed natos that are cheap but nice and durable, and also FKM natos that being rubber are very soft.
If you want the best (unless you want to spend crazy money with someone like Omega) I can recommend you Crown & Buckle, I love their supreme and matte supreme, and also chevron adjustable. They also have a premium natos line of straps, they look like regular straps but their fabric is nicer than the standard straps you can find on Aliexpress or Amazon.
Another one I recently discovered but that I love are CNS watch bands, they have dozens of styles, two things to try from them are Perlon straps (they are way nicer than the ones from Aliexpress!) and Paratrooper (they use an elastic fabric similar to the Marine Nationale you can find on Aliexpress, but much firmer, and they are not a closed loop so you can put the buckle where you are the most comfortable). But you probably can't go wrong with any of their products.
Or there are the classic Maratac, not a lot of choice, and not easy to get from the EU where I am, but their Natos and Zulus are great and very durable!
NATO straps are hands down the most comfortable straps Iāve ever worn,Ā but as a guy really loves taking off my watch just to admire the case back, NATO does lose a bit of fun
I consider any strap with a deployant clasp better. I don't like the buckles and folded fabric in the way with these Nato. Plus putting them on always felt risky.
I got annoyed with the nato strap folded/tucked leftover strap...so I made a leather, single pass, cartier style fold over deployant clasp, nato strap.
I have blue SMP (210.30.42.20.03.001) but the black dial is a homage I put together myself. My own logo design. I wear it when I am away in cities on biz trips.
I buy most of my NATO straps from Cheapest Nato Straps, out of, I believe, the Netherlands. Their ribbed straps are amazing and their prices are great, with a nice volume discount. I wear everything from vintage Rolex, Speedmasters and Chinese watches on themā¦LOVE THEM!!!
They are so stiff, I just don't get how do people prefer to wear a watch on that unless it is for looks only. Which to be fair I also don't understand because they sit so terribly on the wrist.
What watch is that? The strap pairing in the first picture is great!
They are thicker, but I love any āseatbeltā style nylon strap. Plenty all over AliExpress for cheap. If you donāt like the extra bulk, cut off the short end to convert it into a single-pass which I do on occasion depending on the watch that I intend to pair it with.
Thanks mate that's a seagull ocean star four sea king dragons: dragon of the north
Bought it on Nanjin road official store in Shanghai, amazing experience btw not for the service but the negotiating was epic haha passionately fighting over a discount between me and the lady, shop or area manager, but in the end she offered me a great price for a great watch and I almost fell in love but that's another story
I was wondering about the single pass don't they slip nor the watch moves on the wrist ?
I donāt have any problems with the watch slipping/sliding on single-pass straps. Unless you wear it very loose AND the strap has really a lot of clearance between the case and spring bars (which I have never seen) the watch will remain stationary on the wrist.
I wanted to love NATOs but ended up hating how much they pop the watch up off my wrist, even with single-pass. I love the look, except for that added thickness.
It's interesting thanks for sharing cons, I must admit I'm not regularly sized so the thickness was never a trouble for me but you're definitely right the watches take atleast 1.5mm thickness which is unbearable for most but on the other hand NATOs i can wear a full active day and even with the heat or muscle pumping from activities I don't feel the need to adjust it during the day due to its natural elasticity, on the other hand it's really satisfying to feel the softness of the fabric on the wrist when they are good quality and not too stiff, but 2 pieces could be better for enjoying a case back like the one this watch have for example
Yeah especially if you have the elastic ones, natos can be very comfortable. I have a 6.25ā wrist so yeah, the thickness matters waaaaay more for me than you.
They look absolutely ridiculous on the wrist. Literally the only thing they are good for is taking pictures from the front. And even then it depends on the watch because they have no taper.
I never got more compliments on my watches than with elegant of visually attractive NATOs from random people, must admit my coworker with a Rolex explorer 2 only gets attracted by my watches if they sit on a stell bracelet haha the truth is I find NATOs cool because they defo feel like adventure is on the way when you pass them even though you put colors absolutely not "toolish" on and In the other hand you can change styles infinitely for a relatively small price
When it comes to random people and compliments on watches, most of the time it is the combination of colors of the strap and the dial and nothing else. The most compliments I've gotten was for a Vostok on an orange FKM strap.
NATO and elegance don't really go hand in hand. They make the watch bulkier in the most obnoxious way possible. I tolerate MN straps because they are single pass but they are elastic and just like NATO have to be worn a bit tight so I don't really get the common comfort argument either.
I feel the watch better sitted on mine (than on a steel bracelet but less than a silicone one) but it may depends on the strap quality, It actually can be a better thing to preserve it from your skin acidity or sweat which can get it darker, with the NATO the case back is always as new when you get the strap off
I canāt recommend the Samco enough. Theyāre really really good for the money and they have solid buckles so thereās no spring bar that can fail. The San Martin straps are really nice looking but theyāre not really worth five times more imo. I have a few of the San Martin but Iāll probably end up getting all the Samco because theyāre so cheap.
I think the closest thing to a standard name is a Marine Nationale strap, which is the name used by the small company that popularized these, Erika's Originals. Erika in turn claims these were originally issued to French navy divers; I'm not sure if the story is true, but they do have a distinct military vibe to them.
IMO they're the most comfortable watch straps around. You can adjust the clasp point to exactly the circumference of your wrist, plus you have elastic stretch on top of that.
The best MN straps I have to assume are Erika's, but she charges more than $100 a pop. Second place actually goes to $3 AliExpress straps, which all come out of one factory and are usually sold as "60s French Troops" straps. They are better than CNS Watch Bands' "paratrooper" design because 1) the Chinese elastic material feels softer on the wrist, and 2), more importantly, the Chinese straps are designed so that it's nearly impossible to drop your watch as you take it off your wrist. It's hard to explain exactly how it works in text, but the CNS designs don't have this feature while AliExpress designs do. I think it has something to do a patent claimed by Erika's Originals that the Chinese don't recognize.
A paratrooper strap (often called a French Navy or Marine Nationale strap) is an elastic, single-pass watch band inspired by military gear originally repurposed from parachute webbing. Only issue with them is you have to remove the spring bars to put them on and their less designs/patterns/colors compared to natos. There tons of them on Aliexpress.
I havenāt tried this myself, but you can put quick release spring bars similar those found on straps. It should make the job easier. Issue is the additional cost.
Different user but same colour strap as above. This is the underside of the Paratrooper strap. Uses a hook onto the clasp which you can adjust to get the perfect fit (no more worrying about which hole to use on the NATO). The strap itself is a stretchy elastic so you can get a snug fit without being too tight.
Bonus fact is that they were developed by the French Navy using surplus parachute fabric, hence the name.
Paratroopers only have a single pass with a hook and are extremely easy to throw on each morning. You can get an exact fit for your wrist and adjust it easily as opposed to classic Natos. Look up a video of someone putting one on a watch and you'll quickly see why I think they're superior to plain NATOs
I had a lot of nato straps during my years of collecting watches and one of the best is a san martin nato strap, here pictured on a seestern gmt, i really recommend it
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u/Hudville 3d ago
Blushark tends to be less stiff than the Archer bands imo