ZULU ALPHA STRAPS X ELLIOT BROWN COLLABORATION

What’s in a webbing strap?

We go back a long way with Darren at Zulu Alpha Straps and became friends very soon after he started in the strap industry. We began our Elliot Brown journey, sharing stories and instantly hitting it off. His big warm Welsh character is totally infectious to be around.
He’s our kind of watch guy, a decent industry barometer and whenever we meet, we seem to take turns on our respective soap boxes sharing stories and experiences. We can chat for hours with infectious enthusiasm about almost anything.

Beyond the chat and friendship, there’s a shared ethos, a way of being and behaving in business and towards others that has cemented the bond between us and with good friends in the industry.

Zulu Alpha is, without doubt, one of, if not THE pre-eminent brand for beautifully crafted webbing straps made in the UK. Highly regarded both inside and outside military circles around the world. The stout but elegant craftsmanship of the ZA straps is a thing of beauty and we almost felt guilty when we launched our heritage webbing strap a few years back; complete with a neat patented buckle system. There was a mutual agreement that there was plenty of room for both of us and shared product ideas and suppliers which says a lot about the relationship.

Fabric watch straps are in our DNA with the original Animal® webbing straps being our co-founder’s original invention that sold in the millions. Our heritage webbing strap is version 2.0 of the original hook, loop and webbing strap and we have gracefully co-existed with Zulu Alpha for many years, continuing the open dialogue and spinning cheerful dits whenever we meet at events and shows or just to have a coffee...

It’s fair to say we’ve often shared collaborative ideas but the demands of our own businesses have always taken precedence on our collective capacity to really knuckle down and consider how something might work… until early 2024 at the British Watchmakers Day when we finally got our collective acts together and conceived a concrete plan.

"Elliot Brown has been an integral part of the ZA journey right from the start. Their entire team welcomed us warmly, embracing us into their business and generously sharing their industry expertise, culture, and ethos. This support has significantly contributed to the development of ZA.

Over the years, our relationship has flourished, and we now share a diverse customer base in both the enthusiast and defence sectors. Working with a company whose vision aligns so closely with ours has transformed our collaboration into a true partnership, one we're immensely proud of and look forward to nurturing as time goes on." Darren Lindenburg ~ Founder, Zulu Alpha Straps

The plan was simple. Custom-dyed Zulu Alpha premium webbing, mated with our beautifully tactile patented buckle, in a classy co-branded package.

We sampled a good number of single block and stripe options, eventually narrowing it down to 3 unique colours, all dyed and woven in the UK each with its own story. They specifically match up with just about every watch in our collection. It’s fascinating fitting watches with the signature webbing colours plus our four different buckle finishes (matt steel, matt dark gunmetal PVD, matt pale gunmetal PVD (NIVO) and brushed vintage bronze PVD) as it creates some super cool combos.

If you’re not familiar with our patented webbing clamp buckle, it’s the work of three years of honing and refining into the most comfortable, lightweight practical webbing fastening solution. It hinges neatly to follow the wrist's contours, clamps securely for infinite fine adjustment, and thoughtfully results in a short ‘tail’, neatly clamped by the built-in buckle retainer.  As a means of prolonging your strap investment, when one end of the webbing eventually becomes worn, you can flip it around in the buckle and use the other fresh end.

In all honesty we probably haven’t made enough of a noise about the only buckle in the industry with a patent but it’s great that it works so well for the Elliot Brown/Zulu Alpha collab.

Colour Stories:

Flat Dark Earth – (think sandy pale khaki) goes with just about anything.

NIVO – mirrors our unique dial colours and stands for Night Invisible Varnish Orfordness. Originally a trial paint colour used to make bombers invisible when flying at night over water and a very cool shade of stoney grey-blue that is the sort of classy hue folks will ask you about. (I know because I’ve been wearing one on my bronze Beachmaster – Ian)

Stripe - Inspired by the original ‘Bond’ strap worn by Sean Connery – A black with twin flat dark earth lines bordered by our signature orange pinstripes. We used the same bright orange as we do for highlights on many of our watches so it works straight out of the box.

Launched as the strap partner to the “EBINOX” case-hardened Holton Automatic GMT and available separately to pair with your favourite wrist wear.