Anyone who has been out carrying an umbrella on a rainy day will know how difficult it is to maneuver their way through a crowded sidewalk. If you have ever tried it, you will find yourself constantly paranoid about poking someone in the eye (or ear or nose), or constantly faced with the problem of having to perform some complicated calisthenics to try and avoid the inevitable umbrella related accident. This cool gadget by Joo Youn Paek called the ‘Polite Umbrella’ is especially designed so that you don’t have to worry about any inadvertent umbrella-related accidents in the future.
This is how it looks normally
With one simple tug on the handle, this is what happens
As you can see, before the guy tugs on the handle, it looks like any other cool umbrella, but as soon as the guy pulls on the special handle, voila! The umbrella shrinks to half its original size.
Here is a sketch of the design with arrows indicating how it works
Due to its design, the Polite Umbrella is even useful when the weather is both windy and rainy. If you have had the experience of taking an umbrella out in that weather, you will know how difficult it is to make sure your umbrella doesn’t invert itself or, even worse, gets caught in an updraft and goes flying away.
Here’s the best part though… In spite of everything, if you still want to poke someone with an umbrella, then you still can 
If you are wondering how the umbrella will look in action, the creator even added a youtube video. Have a look:
Via: Urlesque
Cool Tech Related Videos
If you enjoyed this post you can - Subscribe Now to the Free Newsletter
Related Tags: cool umbrella, folding umbrella, Product Design, umbrella design, weather umbrella
June 24th, 2009 at 1:23 pm
[...] Trent Belmont What’s with people and umbrella inventions these days? First there was the polite umbrella and now this amazingly cool new invention which is ideal for those people don’t want to poke [...]
June 25th, 2009 at 7:43 am
[...] What’s with people and umbrella inventions these days with such inventions as the polite umbrella and now this amazingly cool new invention which is ideal for those people don’t want to poke [...]
July 30th, 2009 at 4:11 am
[...] via Walyou [...]
August 31st, 2009 at 1:35 pm
I am very interested in buy one polite umbrella. Is it already comercialised? How can I get on eof those?
Looking forward to hearing from you. Thanks. Tatiana
September 23rd, 2009 at 3:19 pm
[...] via Walyou [...]