As I was photographing the watch we’re going to discuss today, I was listening to two YouTubers indirectly arguing about watch trends and the ones they believe don’t age well. Amongst these they explored dial colors and textures, rectangular watches, jump hours, polished bracelets, and summer timepieces. Both engaged in their monologues with passion, each defending their points as well as they could. Both YouTubers mentioned the fact that there are certain microbrands that do better than mainstream ones in some areas—a reality I wholeheartedly agree with and have discussed multiple times through a great many of reviews—however they missed something crucial: the fact that there are smaller houses of horology that not only do better things than the oldest names of the industry—i.e. offering better value, more original designs, superior finishing—but also that don’t give a rat’s ass about what others actually do—whether it be their direct competitors or the old dogs in the hood. They sing their own songs. 

And that is exactly what we’re going to discuss today by taking a first look at Australian-based First Stage and the Alliance Grey. First Stage is a sister brand of Second Hour we’ve talked plenty about on Mainspring, and while I can affirm Second Hour does do whatever it wishes to do without any concern for what others are embarking on—never comparing itself to X or Y brand—its newest horological enterprise bathes in the same waters: it follows the path it has just created for itself and invests all of its creative energy and operational resources to put out remarkable timepieces nobody else could have concocted—and I can also affirm all of that based on how comprehensive, novel, and well-made the Alliance is and the experience I have of Second Hour. And that is indeed the beauty of certain microbrands, that they are so dedicated to their mission and will go to the moon to meet their their goals. And we’ve talked about many of them in this small corner of the internet which we get to do again today. 

The First Stage Alliance comes in five dial colors and retails for $750 AUD/$523 USD on pre-order ($790AUD/$551 USD full-retail) and is currently in production with an estimated delivery for the end of 2026. 

Specifications 

Oh strange is it that we went straight into the pricing and delivery information we normally reserve for the conclusion of a review to have some final pieces of juicy information to share. But it isn’t strange to do so now in fact because from the Alliance stems a spirit of readiness and purposefullness (i.e. we are supposed to grab the damn thing and go live life) that called for all the important beans to be spilled from the get-go. Beans, there are actually many more that are about to come out since First Stage, as does Second Hour with all of its collections, packed a shit ton of incredible specifications into this fairly priced go-anywhere-do-anything everyday sports watch. If you were wondering what would a cooler Tudor Ranger with a date designed by an independent and detail-obsessive mind look like, then the answer would be the First Stage Alliance. But before we begin, a story: the Alliance’s creation was inspired by the trust, readiness, and a commitment to perform military alliances are based on, according to the brand. 

Whether or not the origin story of this collection resonnates with you, well it doesn’t really matter—the First Stage was designed to be legible in all environments and lighting conditions, and be reliable as well as tough regardless of what you do. Which is how many of us would describe a fine modern military or tool watch, built for the things we cannot plan for and easily handle the things that do happen to us on a daily basis—and to accompany us horology-obsessed simple humans on all our adventures irrespective of their nature, location, and level of danger. From a technical standpoint then, the First Stage Alliance first sets itself apart from all other GADA/sports/tool watches we’ve reviewed thus far on Mainspring by the dimensions the brand assigned to the case which are unusually, albeit beautifully, more compact than what we’re used to for this genre: 38mm in diameter, 45.5mm lug-to-lug, 11mm thick, and a 20mm lug width. The dimensions ain’t that bad at all in fact, however the Alliance wears smaller than it ought to. 

The latter is good news for someone who has the immense privilege of having a 6.50”/16.5cm wrist as the Alliance fits naturally on it. Despite its smaller-than-is wrist presence and its actual average dimensions, the Alliance packs a bunch for your next deployment or bar-crawl: 150 meters of water resistance thanks to a 5.3mm screw-down crown and decorated screw-down case-back; a flat sapphire crystal endowed with six (6!) layers of inner anti-reflective coating for an all-conditions legibility; more than generous applications of BGW9 lume on the hands and applied markers; a trusty and respected Miyota 9015 (4Hz/42 hours of power reserve) with a date aperture at the six o’clock; and a fully-articulared stainless-steel bracelet equipped with screw pins, quick-release spring-bars, and a tool-less micro-adjustment mechanism offering five (5) adjustment positions or about 9mm of travel, as scientifically-measured by yours truly. So the Alliance’s specs are excellent however they are on the path of extinction at this price point. 

Design

People say that the written word is the most powerful of tools (weapons) and that it ought to be used wisely. I agree and surely hope so otherwise my online horological meanderings would be pointless. (Should they hold any intrinsic value of course.) As the right word, a sharp sentence construction, can fire the point across with more speed and power than any action could, since ideas aren’t physical but purely mental, akin to a metaphorical bullet piercing through a golden armor. With power then comes purposefullness, an aim to break and a goal to reach. Believe it or not, the First Stage Alliance oozes determination and resolution, to be used to embark on all of  life’s adventures and for you the potential future wearer to act switfly and with intent. These feelings and impressions, however strange it might be for them to be attributed to a timepiece, stem from both what the Alliance is made out of (which we just discussed) and how it looks. In other simpler terms perhaps, it looks the business and means the business. 

Its unique personality comes from two ensembles of design traits we always go through in each review and which are the dial and case. The former was tapestried with a precisely CNC-machined honeycomb pattern which not only elevates its intricacy, adds depth, and forms the perfect basis for all other elements that complement it, but also symbolizes the geometry used in tactical load-bearing systems where the hex grid distributes stress without gaps, flexes under impact, and tiles seamlessly across any surface without failure points. First Stage made a clever connection here between the collection’s name and the dial pattern and transposed this military acting-with-intent-philosophy to the entire dial. For instance through large and polished applied hour markers shaped like trapezoids and rectangles at the cardinal points, tri-faceted hour and minute hands that look badass and are extremely easy to see, a hair-thin seconds hand however equipped with a massive bullet-shaped lumed tip, and a fully integrated date aperture. 

And we need to linger a little bit on the hands. The two larger ones are made of two polished bevels surrounding the lume pits and are finished with painted orange arrow-shaped elements which increase their legibility ten-fold. The seconds hand, as we know, has the largest decorative ornament we’ve ever seen on a timepiece which eases the process of timing an event to the precise second. Put togther then, the three hands are legible and endowed with a tactical personality which goes hand-in-hand with the military-oriented inspiration of this collection. Moving to the case we find the same high-level of on-wrist comfort and finishing we’ve encountered multiple times before on Second Hour watches, an intensely-knurled crown equipped with the orange line in the middle, and a very good bracelet. However, the smaller-than-is wearing experience of the Alliance stems from two places: the way in which the lugs fade into the mid-case by way of finely polished chamfers (making the chassis look very circular) and their shortness. 

Therefore, on the one hand with are met with a balanced and legible dial whose texture evokes strength under stress and its matte appearance absorbs light—which is very tactical in nature—so that all applied elements and hands are easy to see and read. And on the other hand we find a compact case with a classic Second Hour elegant sportive profile which has been a staple of the brand’s horological creations for many years now and something I’ve raved about pently of times before. But First Stage went a step further to fully lock-in this collection’s singular philosophy: a deeply-knurled fixed bezel composed of finely machined teeth separated from one another by a sand-blasted lower structure, each of the former being made of three polished surfaces finished by hand. The case is actually entirely hand-finished and it shows not only looking at all sides and under its belly but particularly so at the bezel—a true work of art which helps grip the watch but more importantly, which completes the visual theme of this timepiece. 

The Heart of the Matter

If the two YouTubers mentioned in the introduction would have gone deeper into their analyses of watch trends that don’t age well, they would have hopefully reached the topic of brands “not giving two cents what others are doing.” If they did, they would have discussed the fact that it is the microbrands that don’t look at what others are doing—therefore which ignore trends, whether they age gracefully or not—that output the best horological creations on the market today. A good friend of mine who runs the marketing department of a popular microbrand told me that he couldn’t care less what other brands do or what people are asking for and instead continue to focus on what they (the brand) believe is the most authentic thing to do which explains why it is so popular for it acts with the most genuine of manner. So there are indeed trends that come and go, some that stick longer than others, but what is most important is the fact of not giving a shit about them. If First Stage did, First Stage wouldn’t exist and would have never created such an original GADA/tool/everyday sports watch that is the Alliance. 

Conclusion 

Indeed, beans have been spilled early and right and left. So there isn’t much to say anymore except the following: the First Stage Alliance is currently in production and retails for $750 AUD/$ 523 USD on pre-order and $790 AUD/$551 USD full-retail. The latter price starts when the brand will deliver the watches that are currently being made. It come in five dials colors—Black, Grey, White, Navy and Turquoise—any of which works for me, surprisingly albeit the Grey is the one that tickled my horological heart with the most intensity. And by the way, the Miyota 9015 is regulated by the way as First Stage indicates a daily accuracy of ±10 seconds. That’s it. 

Thanks for reading.