Today’s post is a little bit of an odd one. We’ve been working for some time to try and get a Signalman in for review, but those are proving to be quite popular, so supplies have been too light to spare a sample loan. In the interim, however, the chaps over at Schofield sent over one of their strap kits – and it is an impressive bit of kit (yeah, that was intended).
The first thing that struck me about this kit (it was fully loaded for our review loan) was the quality of the roll that it was contained in. It was very generously sized, and coated in a a lovely wool (or at least wool-like) fabric – definitely giving things a high-quality feel.
Inside the roll, there are plenty of slots for keeping spare straps (or some watches) as well as a handful of tools that would be needed to change out a strap. I’ve come to appreciate these sorts of rolls more and more, especially the larger ones like we see here (or saw with the Raven Vintage) – it basically gives you a portable work surface where you can safely put a watch down without worrying about a crystal getting scratched or dinged.
Now, what about these straps? We were sent over a mixture of both their canvas and tweed straps; contained in that variety were both the regular and long varieties. I tried to get some shots of the differences to show the lengths; you can also refer to their page here where they explain the differences (summary: if your wrist is under 7.5″, the regular will work for you).
While the canvas straps were soft and flexible, and look sturdy and quite fitting with the nautical theme Schofield goes for, I found the tweeds to be the standouts in the package. While I don’t normally have any tweed in my getup (be it hat or jacket) – yet – these really spoke to me.
For one, they’re different than anything I’ve seen elsewhere. Sure, you can get a rougher leather strap, but then it looks just like that – a rough strap. Here, with the tweed, it would dress up quite nicely, while the rough nature of the wool itself lends itself quite nicely to casual, sweater-wearing weather.
Starting in at $150 (the tweeds are $210), these are not cheap straps. However, it you’re looking for something high quality to pair up with your luxury watch (perhaps a Signalman), these are a great option. For me, the hardest decision would be which of two tweed colors to get! You can view the full lineup here.
