Artem Sailcloth with White Stitching Review – Counter Point

Strap: Artem Straps, Blue Sailcloth Watch Strap with White Stitching and Stainless Steel Deployant Buckle

Introduction

I don’t think anyone ever accused Mike Tyson of being a particularly eloquent speaker. However, he delivered one of my favorite quotes prior to his infamous boxing match with Evander Holyfield – “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” Not at all relevant to watches or watch straps, but time and time again I hear Iron Mike’s voice in my head when something inevitably deviates from what I originally intended. While writing my first review for Strap Sense, I also worked on developing an outline plan to consistently and uniformly guide future reviews to establish some continuity. I thought it was a good plan. Was.

I had a “punched in the mouth” moment when I was presented with a new strap to review. Instead of following my cookie-cutter template plan of receiving a strap just as it would normally be provided by the manufacturer, I was handed this blue sailcloth watch strap from Artem Straps AND the watch Stephen had installed it on: a Timex Sub-Dial Marlin. Queue some immediate unintended initial bias. My outlined approach is to get a blind first impression of the strap when I’m reviewing it, and it’s very difficult when this absolute banger of a watch is there, hogging the brain-processor power – Tyson’s glove meets cheek. [So, side note: this combination works. But that’s not why we’re here… we’re here to focus on, and talk just about watch straps.] All I was told was that this was a new strap from Artem, a design evolution from a prior strap, and that it was a very rugged sailcloth material.

First Impressions

Packaging: Not really applicable for this review since the strap was provided on a watch from Strap Sense. To be as consistent and fair as possible, I searched for Artem Straps unboxing videos on YouTube. Unsurprisingly, since there is a niche market for absolutely everything, I was able to watch other people open Artem Straps packaging. It appears that these straps are packaged in a cardboard sleeve, foil embossed with the Artem name, inside a foil bubble mailer. Assuming what I found in the multiple videos is accurate, the packaging is simple but functional. Overall, I find the customized inner packaging to be fairly eco-responsible as it could be recycled after opening, and the outer packaging seems to be durable enough to assure safe delivery.

Strap Materials: This strap has three obvious materials: the sailcloth of the band, a softer material on the underside, and a rubber reinforcement at the adjustment holes. The strap is marked on the underside with the ARTEM name and the strap width. The top-stitching is a contrasting white color and the bottom-stitching is color matched dark-blue to the underside material. There are seven adjustment holes in the long half in which the deployant clasp can be placed to size the strap appropriately. Near the spring bars, a light padding layer is sandwiched between the sailcloth and inner-liner.

The sailcloth material is lightly firm. It can be bent easily but tends to want to return to a flat profile. With the padding near the spring bars and the rigid section at the deployant clasp, I found that the strap was a little resistant to conforming to my wrist. Not enough to create any pressure points, but enough that I found myself repeatedly trying to squeeze it into position to fit better.

The edges of the strap are nicely fixed and have no rough or sharp areas. With the reinforcement at the adjustment holes, it seems that this strap would not be apt to fraying for a very long time.

Buckle: This deployant clasp is primarily brushed stainless steel with some polished accents and two push buttons on the buckle to release the clasp. Given the moderately complex geometry, it appears to be cast manufactured with final surface machining and detail finishing. It’s simply marked “Stainless Steel” on the underside and has an engraved Aterm Straps diamond logo on the outward side of the clasp. This day and age, almost everything is available cheaply from an Asian manufacturer but the extra details, while subtle, make this deployant appear more of a custom part rather than a bulk made low quality part.

The Wearing Experience

Install: No problems here. Most of the wrist time I spent with this was on the Marlin provided by Strap Sense. But for the sake of the exercise, I easily removed the strap from the watch and installed it on my Farer Halley moonphase. I appreciate the tool-less changing due to the quick-release spring bars which fit precisely and snuggly in both watches.

Wrist Comfort: As alluded to earlier, I wasn’t totally enamored with how this wore on my wrist. The strap kept wanting to return to a circular shape no matter how much I squeezed it into an oblong. While it never felt exactly right, it didn’t ever feel wrong, if that makes sense. If I owned this strap, I might have tried submerging it in hot water briefly to see if I could shape it more permanently in a less round profile. The only other nit I could pick was the relative thickness of the strap at the deployant where the two layers of strap sandwich the deployant mechanism. While not an issue the majority of the time, I found it more comfortable to take the watch off my wrist when typing at the computer keyboard.

What I Think is the Expected Cost

Factors: The sailcloth material – could go either way with this… I could see this being marketed as a niche material that commands a premium, OR, I could see it as an eco-friendly material with a narrative that it’s using fabric that would otherwise be discarded. Although it seems like “green” products command their own premium, so that might not make it any more of an affordable option. The deployant clasp gives a clean appearance and is consistent with a higher-end product. The final finishing of the clasp shows some time was spent during manufacturing, definitely falling on the higher side between mass production and one-off.

Expected Price: My gut tells me this could be marketed somewhere between $120 and $170. Given the durability of the material, the quality of the clasp, and the overall fit and finish, I could entirely believe this would be a strap that would never die. I’ve got a feeling that Artem knows that as well and would price them accordingly… which makes sense for durable products. I imagine it’s hard to stay in business when you sell a product that literally lasts for life, so the initial margins need to be a bit higher. One wildcard factor that I can’t shake is the deployant clasp. If these are produced in house from a custom design, I could see the expected price being up at the higher $170 level. 

What I’d Pay

$80. Because of the aforementioned durability, I can see the logic in spending a little more than I’d typically be comfortable, knowing it will hold up forever. The deployant clasp is nice and is well engineered, but is most likely the biggest gap between my perceived value and Artem’s marketing. For $80, I’d happily live with the thickness of the deployant sandwich, but much more than that and I’d really be thinking hard about if the value of the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.

Summary

Overall, I felt this was a nice strap. There were some design aspects that I think would improve the strap, in my opinion, but that’s outside of this review’s scope. I’m sure that one of the selling points of this strap is the clean appearance when buckled, but for wearability and my personal aesthetic preference, I’d like to see it with a traditional pin and buckle. Over the few weeks I had it on my wrist, I never felt like I needed to be excessively careful with it. The slightly rubbery texture shrugged off any scuffing or marking and I think this would certainly be a great strap for a tool watch that will see some rugged adventures. As well as this strap works on the Strap Sense Marlin, I think it would be right at home on my Farer Halley and is a contender for a future purchase if the price is in my ballpark.

Postscript

After writing this review, I went and looked up this strap on the Artem Straps website and saw that it is called the “Classic Navy Blue Sailcloth Watch Strap with White Stitching and Stainless Steel Deployant Buckle” and the “sailcloth” is not, in fact, actual cloth from a boat sail. Rather it is a textured synthetic material and the underside is actually leather coated with rubber. That might negate some of my prior consideration of the eco-nature of the material.

Initially, I was pretty impressed with myself because my estimated cost was within a few dollars of the actual list price of $133. But then I had to use my critical reading skills and learned that is only the base price of the strap and didn’t include the quick release spring bars (+$13) nor the deployant clasp (+$68). So the actual cost of the strap as installed is $214… which made me chuckle considering it about doubled the value of the watch it was on. Felt a bit like a Tyson punch in the mouth.

I briefly considered the potential cost of the clasp previously, thinking that it might add an additional $50 if it was a custom design, which it very well may be. Interestingly, Artem also offers this sailcloth material strap with a standard tang-buckle for $85. At the end of the day, is this a $200+ strap? Perhaps… To me, it must have a lot to do with the watch it’s being paired with. A $300 Timex? Maybe not. A $3000 Swiss? Maybe that starts to make sense. The fact that Artem offers this strap material in different buckle styles and with the ability to configure a la carte options, it seems possible to find the right fit for either watch.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Joe Durning is an Engineer by profession and has always appreciated watches from afar. He aspired to someday obtain two pieces: an Omega Speedmaster Professional “Moon Watch” and a Tag Heuer Monaco “Steve McQueen”. Thanks to the 2020 pandemic lockdown, not only did he acquire both, he also developed a burgeoning hobby collecting interesting, novel, and unique timepieces. Aside from a keen passion for vintage Japanese watches, he also highly appreciates the craft and risk-taking designs of modern Independent watchmakers. Joe’s collection spans from an early-1900 pocket watch through 1970s “quartz crisis” Seikos, and up to a modern field watch from S.U.F Helsinki. He is perpetually hunting for the next watch that has a story to tell.