Ruitao Li
Personal selection
Umbrella, as a design with thousand years history, plays an important, irreplaceable role in both people’s daily life and some countries’ traditional ceremonies. Umbrella is such a great design that helps people live better and being used in every corner of the world. And this article can let you know much more about umbrella than before.
History
The very first umbrella appeared 4000 years ago in ancient China, and it was created for emperors to show their power and protection over people. The umbrella kept evolving since its first appearance and more than one thousand years later, the waterproof umbrella was finally created in ancient China. It is believed that a Chinese woman, Yun, designed the first collapsible waterproof umbrella for her husband to protect him from rain and sunlight around 500 BC. It was also the first time that umbrella went into common people’s daily life rather than being an expensive item especially for the noble.
The design of umbrella was later brought to Korea and Japan as well as some Asian countries around China. But not until the appearance of the Silk Road, umbrella was traded to Persia and western countries like France and England.
Function
The umbrella was first designed for emperors and nobles to show their wealth and social status. In ancient China, umbrella was also set on horse cart to provide shelter for rich people. Around 500 BC, the most common waterproof umbrella was created and people started to use umbrellas in raining days, preventing themselves from being soaked. In Europe, the umbrella was also function as a symbol of social status and wealth at first. After 18th century, since the material used for umbrella evolved and provided better waterproof ability than before, the mass production began and umbrella became a common product for everyone. And the function of umbrella remained unchanged since then, which is to protect people from sunlight and rain and make a better life for everyone uses it.
User
During the ancient age, umbrella was hard to produce and very expensive. Therefore, only nobles and rich people could afford umbrella to show their difference from common people. Time passed and umbrella designers figured out better ways to produce umbrellas with better, cheaper materials. So the price went down and more and more common people started to become the users of umbrella. Nowadays, almost everyone on the planet uses umbrella in their daily life.
Materials & Production
The most important development for umbrella was the idea of using “U” shaped steel, conceived by Samuel Fox. The “U” shaped steel is able to make a lighter, stronger frame for umbrella. This development has made rounded metal ribs and stretchers more feasible and user friendly. Modern rain umbrellas are made with fabrics like nylon that is light, steady, has great waterproof ability, and can dry quickly and fold easily.
Surprisingly, due to the foldable structure and the materials used in umbrella, even though umbrella has been used for thousands of years, modern umbrella is still made by a hand-assembly process. Machines make the components for umbrella and workers then assemble the parts by hand, from the handle to the canopy.
Affordance
Umbrella may be one of the designs which have the best affordance in the world. The handle and the shaft tell people to hold; the concave canopy indicates people that it’s a shelter to protect them; the stretchers imply people to open the whole umbrella. Every part works perfectly and depends on each other. Only such a well-structured, beautiful design can form an umbrella and can be inherit for thousands of years.
Resources
Records of the Grand Historian, Qian Sima
