It took Blancpain quite a while to offer more strap alternatives to owners of the FF/Bathyscaphe, but recently a variety of new Nato straps have been introduced. So this blog post is not about a specific watch but three of the new 23mm Nato straps for the 43mm Bathyscaphe and 45mm Fifty Fathoms models. Let’s take a close look on and off the wrist.

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Whether camouflage is the right term to describe the design of these straps I really don’t know. There may very well be a different thought process behind the design of these straps (most likely a underwater reference), but let’s stick to this description in lack of a better official explanation.

They for sure are far from being your average Camo strap: here we don’t talk about a printed but a woven pattern, a technique called Jacquard. The straps have an exceptional look and feel, very comfortable and sophisticated. Let’s take a very close look at the details of the straps:

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Done in three color schemes the straps are clearly meant to work well with the different case and dial colors that can be found in the Fifty Fathoms/Bathyscaphe catalogue. For this introduction I worked with one watch only, though. The titanium Bathyscaphe ref 5000-1210 does not feature vibrant colors, but it should give you a pretty good idea of the three Jacquard Nato straps in real life.

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The first strap I fitted to the Bathyscaphe was the taupe/off white/light brown one. It works extremely well with the anthracite dial of the watch imho, giving the Bathyscaphe a slightly warmer look.

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The blue/grey/light blue strap was next. It obviously isn’t meant for a rather monochrome grey watch but those FF/Bathyscaphe with blue dials. And among the three Jacquard Nato straps this is the one I wasn’t entirely convinced of.

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The third option, executed in anthracite/off white/grey, works perfectly again. I can also picture this strap to be a splendid choice for any black ceramic Bathyscaphe. In case of the titanium Bathyscaphe it keeps the monochrome look but adds some nice depth to it.

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To provide you with a full picture here are a few wrist shots of all three straps. Again, some color combinations work better with the monochrome titanium Bathyscaphe than others, especially the blue strap is better suited for a blue dial timepiece. But at least you get a good idea of the looks.

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Personally I like the new Jacquard Nato straps a lot and welcome them as a first step towards a larger strap variety available from Blancpain. The straps are available for order through Boutiques and ADs, unfortunately they are not featured on the Blancpain website (yet?). But the Bathyscaphe titanium is and can be found here.

My hands-on with the Bathyscaphe 5000-1210-NAGA is available here, on the fabulous titanium bracelet here in the blog.

I hope you enjoyed the introduction to the straps and the photos.

Cheers

Henrik